


The Librarian's Daughter

by fiacresgirl



Series: Angels and Archangels [1]
Category: Arrow (TV 2012)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Angels, F/M, Magic, Olicity Big Bang, War
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-28
Updated: 2016-01-30
Packaged: 2018-05-10 01:44:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 10
Words: 38,700
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5564191
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fiacresgirl/pseuds/fiacresgirl
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p></p><div class="center">
  <p>
    <br/>
    <img/>
    <br/>
  </p>
</div>On the edge of the Empire of Angels in far Karelia stands Zvyozda Castle, where humans are ruled over by the angels they fear and resent. Karelia is under siege by its familiar enemy, the Skalvians. These fierce warriors defeated them fifteen years ago and executed many of its angel leaders. Here lives Felicity, the librarian's daughter.<p> </p><p> </p><p>Oliver's father was killed in that long ago battle. He flew from Zvyozda, scarred, with his mother and sister, but his father's last words - a demand to find out who betrayed them and avenge him - remain in his mind. When Oliver learns of Zvyozda's new troubles, he returns to his home to find it changed from what it had been and not for the better with enemies both outside and within the castle's walls.</p><p> </p><p> </p><p>Raised by a man who hates angels, Felicity trusts none of them, but the seriousness of the danger that her home faces forces her into helping Oliver with his mission to save her people and find the traitor who betrayed all of them.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Prologue

**Author's Note:**

> The Librarian's Daughter would not be possible in this improved form without the help and coaching of my dear beta, [lerayon](http://archiveofourown.org/users/lerayon/pseuds/lerayon), who read every chapter as it was written and gave me feedback and [hotcookinmama](http://archiveofourown.org/users/hotcookinmama/pseuds/hotcookinmama) who read everything through for grammar for me. [Lauren](http://archiveofourown.org/users/Laurabella2930/pseuds/Laurabella2930) provide some beautiful art for it as well. It would not have been written at all had the Olicity Fic Bang not existed this fall. 
> 
> I would like to dedicate this story to my lovely niece, Annie, who is a prolific reader, already an avid writer at age 14, and the best librarian's daughter you'll ever meet.
> 
> For additional notes, see here ([for world building](http://fiacresgirl.tumblr.com/post/135644849114/a-note-on-fictional-world-building)) and here ([for naming](http://fiacresgirl.tumblr.com/post/136047541989/a-note-on-names-in-the-librarians-daughter)).
> 
> This piece has 9 chapters and a prologue and is the first in a series of three.

The angels were assembling for war, and Oliver knew with his whole being, from his roiling stomach to the tips of his pale wings, that they were not ready for it.

An icy wind blew across the wide Westphalian plain and was channeled by the Sambian Mountains, as if through a chute, to roar and blast the Zvyozda fortress. The castle, built as it was out of rock into the base of the steepest peak, Mount Lyeda, remained unaffected, as did its inhabitants. Oliver thought that would be easier to manage when you were in blissful ignorance about the finer details of this year’s tribute delivery, as was most of Zvyozda’s population. He was not that lucky. 

Robert, his father, and an important member of the Council of Angels, had instructed Oliver to scout out the sloping steppe that lay before the castle wall, and so he was flying high above it, and then swooping low when he saw movement. So far there had been nothing more menacing than a stray cow pulling the piece of the fence that had held her rope lead. Oliver flew down and freed her from this burden and then returned her to the nearest farm. The people there had not even noticed her disappearance yet, but they fawned all over him for the service rendered. Angel, angel - we thank the gods for you! He left with his belly full of fried eggs, bread with butter, and kvas.

Oliver wasn’t sure what he should be on the lookout for. This was the first year he would be allowed outside when the Skalvians arrived, ready to receive their outrageous demands in exchange for not ransacking this farflung edge of the Angel Empire. All children twelve and under remained in the mountain on Tribute Day, so he had never even heard the hooves of the Skalvian horses galloping up the cobbled road that led to the barbican, nor had he viewed the bloodless enemy in person. It was all just legend to him.

He had seen pictures, though, of those giants with their long white hair and their clear, colorless eyes - drawings in books. His father had taken him to the library when he’d heard about today’s mission, and Adalbert, the librarian, had brought out the requested texts to the reading room and found several old sketches of their enemy. Having seen these renderings, Oliver didn’t feel any more prepared.

He flew against the wind now, letting his wings beat against the cold. He didn’t tire; angels rarely did. They were bigger than people and stronger. He wasn’t fully grown, but he could break a piece of wood - or a man’s arm - with a flap of his wing. He imagined flying into a mass of Skalvians, aiming his bow, wings fully outstretched yelling, “You will go home empty handed this year, and my people will have enough to eat this winter!” It was a very satisfying image, and he played with it a bit, varying the size of the Skalvian crowd and the expressions of fear on their faces until he had them just right in his mind.

By now he was nearing the top of Mount Lyeda, and he flew down again to stand on a thin ledge. From here he could see the entire plain and the winding mountain path that led through the Sambians and into whatever was beyond. His tutor said it was the great White Sea and that it battered against the Sambian mountains with the ferocity of all the gods.

Here all was peaceful, though, at this moment, and the sun glinted off the orange and yellow of the trees the farmers had planted to shelter their crops from that unending Westphalian wind. Oliver saw a bit of white, too, reflecting the sun’s rays, way in the distance. He squinted as he flew closer, until he could confirm it: a long line of white - white men, white horses, and white and red flags. He dove towards the castle to let his father and the others know. 

 

>>\--->

 

Two days later, chained to a wall in the cellar of a barn, his thighs and wings covered in dried blood, Oliver held his father’s head in his lap. Robert was too weak to sit up, and Oliver could see the pale Skalvian wraiths milling about in the field outside through a gap in the barn door. He wondered how he would possibly get his father and himself back home in both their current condition and situation.

Robert’s remaining eye slowly opened and he reached a hand out and placed it on Oliver’s arm. “Son,” he said.

“Don’t talk, Papa,” Oliver said. “You need to save your strength for when we escape.”

Robert smiled wearily. “I’m not going to escape, son,” he said. “They are executing an angel before the castle every hour until the tribute is paid, and I will be dead before the day is out. But, you - you can escape.”

Oliver lifted his hand up to display the shackle. “I can’t,” he said. “They have me chained.”

Robert closed his eye and breathed deeply. “The chain is nothing against angel strength. Focus all of your energy into your hand. Imagine everything in your body is nothing, only that hand remains as proof of all of you, and pull. The chain will break.”

“But even if I could do that, there is no way out of here. We are surrounded by Skalvian warriors, and they are everywhere outside the castle.”

“They aren’t in the barn,” Robert said. “And this barn is not some simple farmer’s property. It houses the Archangel’s stores, and it will have a tunnel below it.”

“A tunnel?”

“Yes, there is a vast web of passages that run below and throughout the mountain. They are guarded today with men and earth magics, but your wings will let you pass. Use your gift, Oliver, and it will lead you to safety.”

“But why can’t you come too? I’ll help you through the tunnels, and we can go back together.”

“Because they know who I am and where I am supposed to be. You’re more important to save. I’ve lost too much blood to live anyway. Listen, Oliver, I have to tell you a few things, and you need to pay attention.” 

Oliver bit his lip and dug his fingernails into his palms. He couldn’t think of the world without his father. What was even left in the castle, if he managed to make it there? Grief? Starvation? It was too much to bear, but his father was looking at him intensely, and he realized his full attention was the last gift he could give him.

“I’m listening,” he said.

“We were betrayed,” Robert said.

“Betrayed?” Oliver whispered. Who would betray them?

“Yes, and at the highest levels. Most of the Council of Angels wanted to wait until next year to defy the tribute. We were going to seek help from the Empire, the other angels. And we were going to do our research.” 

“You were going to do research?” Oliver asked. “How? On what?”

“These Skalvians,” Robert said, in a weakening voice, “they’re strong, very strong, but they’re not invulnerable. I’ve heard rumors they have a weakness. Go to Adalbert and ask him to see the travelers’ tales. There are accounts. I have read some, but there are others, and only a few know about them.

“When you return to Zvyozda, watch to see who benefits from all this death. Whoever that is, he is the traitor, and he has ruined us all today. Be careful. Bide your time and wait until you’re older and strong. But when that day comes, avenge me and your fellow angels. Promise me you will. Promise me.” He pointed at his son, and his hand shook with the remnants of his failing strength and his rage. 

“I promise, Papa. I will.”

“Good,” Robert said. He took his shaking hand and placed it over his son’s heart. He said the old words of blessing, made the sign of Byelobog, and then he put his hand on Oliver’s chain, shut his eyes and focused. The color leached from his face. He gave a swift, strong pull, and the chain broke from the pin on the wall. He opened his eyes.

“Now go,” he said. “The back of the barn will have a section in the floor. Find it, lift it, and get out of here. Remember what I said. Watch to see who benefits because he has stolen your future from you, and you must get it back.”

“Are you sure? I could stay until they come. I don’t want to leave you alone here to...alone to...”

“You have to,” Robert said with finality. “There is no point in your staying. Tell your mother and your sister that I love them and that I did not die a coward.” 

Oliver hesitated, but his father closed his eye and turned away from him, still ghostly pale from his efforts with the chain. Oliver touched his father’s hand. “I love you, Papa,” he said.

“I love you too, son,” Robert said. “Now go!”


	2. The Problems of Angels

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Felicity must deal with an unwanted suitor, and Oliver is confronted with unresolved problems from his past.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here is a map of the northern part of Karelia for reference (a larger copy [is here](https://twitter.com/fiacresgirl/status/905289798260318210)): 
> 
>  

_Zvyozda Castle, fifteen years later_

 

The summer sun beat down on the stones and cobbles of Zvyozda, and Felicity stopped to catch her breath as she climbed the stairs to the terraced gardens. With rumors of the Skalvians traveling further and further into Karelia and new people streaming in from the countryside daily, the value of these vegetable beds was immeasurable. This year she had even more carefully calculated the output per plant before she planted even the first seeds. Thank goodness for the foresight of the original builders. The Skalvians might one day batter at the gates and fling rocks over the walls, but these beds were built into the cliff itself and were sheltered from assault by the outer wall and the keep.

She opened the gate to the gardens, and shooed the chickens off the garden path. Adalbert, her stepfather, and the castle’s archivist and librarian, was fussing about the grape arbor, and her young friend Simon was digging through the cabbage patch. When Simon saw her, he came running. His limp was less pronounced now, and she was grateful.

“Miss Felicity,” he said, “Everything is growing so well! We have early cucumbers and onions, as well as beets and parsley. It’s so nice to have something fresh to eat.” He held up a handful of carrots and smiled.

“It is,” she said. “Can you and the other children take everything to the main kitchen? We should be able to make a large vat of soup and share the wealth.”

“I will!” he said, turning and gesturing at his friends who were playing on the terraced steps.

“You’ll have to draw some water from the well too,” she said. “Since the section of the aqueduct that runs to the kitchens seems to be clogged by something again and no one has fixed it yet today.”

“I saw angels flying above the city this morning,” Simon said. “Do you think that’s a good sign?”

“Chyernobog spare me from the notice of angels,” she said, and Simon gave her a grin before he and two other children picked up a crate of vegetables and began carrying it away.

“Not all angels, I hope,” said a voice behind her, and Felicity turned to see a pair of blue eyes twinkling down at her from the too-handsome face of her most recent problem.

“Angel Thomas,” she said. “I wasn’t expecting to see you here in the community garden,” she said.

“Angel Thomas?” he said, and the tips of his wings ruffled behind him. “I thought I told you to call me Tommy.” His smile was not insincere, but Felicity knew with how little effort this angel could get and had gotten what he wanted. There weren’t many women in the city who would turn down the attention of an angel, let alone this black-haired celestial with his glossy, dove-gray wings.

He pulled a basket out from underneath his arm and presented it to her with a tiny flourish. “For you, madam.”

She looked down at the basket. It was piled high with mountain herbs and the medicinal berries that grew this time of year on the bushes lining the River Yura. It was, in fact, what she had been saying she wished she could go and collect herself just the other day because without them weathering the winter would be much harder. Now this disaster had gone and gotten them for her and was waiting - waiting - for her gratitude.

“I do not feel comfortable addressing you as ‘Tommy,’ Angel Thomas,” she said in a carefully neutral tone. “But thank you for this gift. It was very thoughtful of you and will be a great help.” She prayed he would get the hint. One did not simply dismiss an angel, especially when one was a half-angel female nobody with Zvyozda-clan ties only through marriage.

“Oh, it was no bother, starling,” he said. “It felt good to stretch my wings, to be honest.”

She knew he was lying because angels didn’t gather berries or herbs. It was peasant work, and it involved ducking and reaching into small spaces. Children were often tasked with it. He had put himself out for her, whatever his motivations. For that she was willing to let the bird endearment pass.

“I know that isn’t true, and it makes your gift more valuable,” she said. “I am grateful for your help.”

He pounced on the opening. “I could be of further help to you. I could repair the aqueduct and get the water running again. It’s a simple job for anyone with wings. You know, this castle was originally angel built.”

“Angel designed,” Felicity said and then bit her tongue. Angels didn’t appreciate it when you corrected them, but it irked her when they took credit for absolutely everything.

Tommy’s smile widened. “I take your point,” he said. “Angel designed. But angels did do much of the elevated work, including the aqueducts.”

“And humans did all all the stonemasonry and dug the tunnels and chambers into the mountain.”

“Yes, well,” Tommy said, “that’s harder to do with these things attached to your back.” He ran a finger through the feathers of his left wing, and she wondered if they were as soft as they looked. Only one person she knew had ever touched an angel’s wing. You weren’t supposed to look at them even, but the way Tommy was preening before her she didn’t think he would mind. In fact, if what her friend Kalina said were true, he liked being petted like a cat.

“Say the word, and it’s done. It’s not like I have anything better to do. It’s been unbelievably dull in Zvyozda lately; I’d like to feel useful.”

And there it was: “It’s been unbelievably dull.” What must it be like to not have the pressing threat of starvation this winter hanging over your head like a sword? Angels didn’t have concerns about survival. The Council of Angels set the ration. The Council of Angels had their own stores, and angels could leave the city whenever they wanted. It was simple enough to travel when you could fly.

She was about to turn him down politely when Adalbert called out, from his arbor, “That would be much appreciated, Angel Thomas. Thank you so much for thinking of the needs of this castle.” Felicity turned to give Adalbert a look, but his calm expression did not change. “Isn’t that right, Felicity?”

She crossed her arms in front of herself, but forced a smile. “Yes, again, it’s very thoughtful of you, Angel Thomas,” she said.

“Tommy,” he said. “And your pleasure is the only reward I need.” He touched the upper sleeve of her dress gently, flashed his white teeth, and then flew off in two strides. Felicity was left wondering what the real cost of his help would turn out to be.

“Adalbert,” she said, turning to him, “you know you shouldn’t encourage him. Angels have one use for women - isn’t that what you’ve always said?”

“I’m not worried about you, Felicity,” he said. “You see him for who he is. You’re not an angel follower.” He gave a small laugh and gestured to his arbor. “The kitchen water line connects to the garden’s as well, and my grapes are thirsty. Besides, it will do him good to have to work a bit for no reward.”

Felicity crossed her arms. “‘Debts to angels do not go unpaid.’ Whose adage is that?” She couldn’t stay mad at Adalbert too long, however. He had saved her life when he’d married her mother, and he’d raised her as if she were his own daughter. He taught her his own skills and the secrets of the library. If his grapes needed watering, she’d do what she had to do to make sure that happened. Perhaps she was worrying for nothing. Of all the angels, Tommy was perhaps the most easy going. Not like his father. Malcolm’s face flashed in her mind, and she frowned.

She looked at Adalbert’s round, ruddy face. His sideburns and beard were wet with sweat, and the top of his head was sunburned. He was tiring in the heat, and he wouldn’t think about taking care of himself, only the grapes. “Let’s get you some water,” she said, taking him by the arm. “Have you gone over the figures from the garden? Will we have anywhere near close to enough to get us through the winter?”

 

>>\--->

 

_Celestia, the Angel Palace_

 

The angel was young and eager, and he clearly had something to say, but he was not going to get a chance to divulge it, Oliver knew, if he didn’t calm down. The capital had no patience for excitement, and they despised anything with even a whiff of provincialism. Today’s archangel court was no departure from that. Yeomen giving testimony about grisly murders happening in the countryside surrounding Celestia were laughed out of the room and their report ignored merely because of their pronunciation of the word “blood.” It was sickening.

Something about this boy held his gaze, and he began to feel the tingling warmth of his gift begin in his chest and radiate to his hands. Oliver didn’t want to look at him, but his eyes kept returning to the space he was standing, almost hovering in. His face had a starstruck expression. Angels from the far territories were often comical in their response to seeing rooms - even stadiums - full of only angels, but this boy’s excitement was transparent, and something inside Oliver needed to know what the message was that he’d come to relay.

Oliver eased his way around the atrium. Most of the angels here came for the entertainment and not for the news, so he didn’t have to try too hard to get through the mass. The man on the stand now was talking about the lack of fish in the Zenne River. It wasn’t riveting stuff. When he reached the boy, he realized that the younger angel was a bit older than he’d thought at first. He was tall and thin, with a head full of brown curls, but he had facial hair, and up close his face held a seriousness Oliver had overlooked. He touched him gently on his shoulder, and the angel turned around and smiled widely.

“Oh, hello,” he said. “Do you think they’ll get through the number of petitioners today? I’ve been waiting all morning, and they haven’t called my name yet.”

“Your name?” Oliver asked.

“I’m sorry,” the angel said. “I should have introduced myself. We are not so formal at home. My name is Bartholomew. I’m here on behalf of the Ogon clan.”

“Ogon? Where are you from?” Oliver asked, feeling a sudden apprehension. “I’m Oliver, by the way. I live here in Celestia.”

“Zvyozda Castle,” Bartholomew said. “In Karelia. It’s very far away. I’ll understand if you haven’t heard of it. I’m here to petition the angels on behalf of the people there.”

“I’ve heard of it,” Oliver said. “I grew up there. I left when I was thirteen, though - after the Skalvians executed my father.”

Bartholomew’s eyes grew wide. “You’re Oliver. So your father was...Angel Robert?” he asked.

“Yes,” Oliver said.

“I’ve heard stories about you,” Bartholomew said. “They say you were taken and tortured, but you escaped.”

Oliver didn’t say anything. He wasn’t going to talk about the worst thing that had ever happened to him with this boy from Zvyozda in a room full of the worst gossips - or anywhere else. After a long minute Bartholomew got the hint.

“Oh, I’m sorry! I didn’t mean… In any case, you at least will want to know what’s going on then. The angel scouts in Karelia report that the Skalvians are already in Karelia this year, laying waste to the southern parts. The steppe farmers are fleeing and crowding into the northern villages, driving their livestock all the way to Zvyozda. We paid the full tribute last year, so I’m not sure why they are attacking. Archangel Waldhar has left to parley with them, but neither he nor his angel guard has yet returned, and unless we can find a way to replace the crops they would have raised, much of citizenry will starve this winter. I have to find a way to persuade the Justices here to send help and supplies.”

Oliver closed his eyes against the images the angel’s words stirred in his memory. Straw soaked in blood, his father’s white face, a Skalvian sword descending, and hungry, gray faces of his people, the Zemlya clan. He remembered his mother grabbing a bag full of belongings and dragging Thea and him through the tunnels and out a hidden door at the back of Mount Lyeda. It seemed a very long time ago, but he could still smell the blood.

“Oliver, Oliver? Are you alright?” Bartholomew was peering into his face, looking concerned. Oliver realized he’d bitten down on his own lip so hard that he’d drawn blood. He shook his head to clear it and then took Bartholomew by the arm.

“There’s nothing for you here, Bartholomew. The justices won’t hear your plea, and even if they did, they won’t care about what goes on in the outmost reaches of the empire. But come home with me. It’s possible my family can do something to aid your cause.”

The younger angel smiled at him trustingly. “It’s Barry,” he said. “Call me Barry.”

 

>>\--->

“Who sent you?” Moira asked without prologue. Oliver had taken Barry to their private residence in Celestia, and Barry’s eyes were again wide as he took in the opulence of the marble chamber. Moira had decorated it specifically to impress and intimidate, so she must be getting some satisfaction out of his response. Her chilly expression revealed nothing, however. He found her hard to read sometimes, even though he was her son.

Barry swallowed. “I beg your pardon, angela?”

Moira smiled in an entirely nonreassuring way. “You’ve flown thousands of miles to present your case, and while I can see you have good intentions, unless children are now ascending to archangel in Zvyozda, it wasn’t on your own authority. So who has sent you to plead the castle’s cause?”

Barry shot him a look, and Oliver nodded. “The angel Malcolm, ma’am,” Barry said.

“Malcolm,” Moira said. Oliver heard her cross her legs under the silken embroidery of her morning gown. “And when did you arrive?”

“This morning, ma’am,” Barry said. He looked at Oliver uncertainly. “Perhaps I should have remained at court to present my case.”

Moira waved a hand. “The justices are hearing cases today that have been on the docket for weeks, and I assume you did not pay the blat?”

“The blat?” Barry asked.

“The bribe,” Oliver said. “Nothing in Celestia is done without payment.”

“But they’re our leadership,” Barry said. “The taxes we send…”

“Are so the empire’s angels do not turn your province into brimstone and ash,” Moira said. “You arrived today, you did not know about the blat, and the court closes tomorrow for summer recesses. Since Malcolm told you none of this, he sent you for his own reasons. I’m more interested in those than I am in the details of your presentation.”

“But the people in Zvyozda--” Barry said.

“Have two pressing problems and are only aware of one,” Moira said.

“I’m going back with him,” Oliver said, and both Barry and Moira turned their heads in surprise.

“You will not,” Moira said.

“Father bid me find out who betrayed us,” Oliver said. “It was his last wish, that I should right this wrong.”

“We are safe in Celestia,” Moira said. “I brought you here, back to my family’s estate, so that you and your sister could be happy. So that you could develop your skills and abilities--”

“Which I did,” Oliver said, “a long time ago.”

“--not so that you could go back to Zvyozda and kill yourself in an unwinnable war.”

“Zemlya is my clan, Mother,” Oliver said. “They’re my people, and they’re suffering. I’ve been selfish long enough. It’s time to make good on my promise. We both know the empire will not lift a finger to help either Zvyozda or Karelia. Perhaps I can. Besides,” he raised his hands to show her, “My gift is pulling me in his direction, and you know it sends me where I need to go.”

“But Malcolm,” Moira said, her voice higher and more shrill.

“Malcolm was Father’s friend,” Oliver said. “Surely he will help me know what to do to rid Zvyozda of Skalvians once and for all.”

Moira shook her head. “If you must go back - if you have to do this dangerous thing - do not make your father’s same mistake and trust Malcolm.” She turned to Barry and demanded: “You duty is to keep him safe. You seem smart enough to understand that. You do not want to know what will happen if my son is hurt.” She leaned over and placed an elegant hand on his knee while she locked eyes with him.

Barry straightened. “I will, ma’am. I mean, he won’t. He won’t be hurt. I won’t let anything happen to him.”

Moira looked unimpressed. “Remember what I said about Malcolm,” she said.


	3. Unwanted Proposals

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Malcolm's ultimatum that Tommy marry affects Felicity in a way she was not expecting.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I plotted this little piece while listening to Camille Saint-Saëns' [Danse Macabre](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YyknBTm_YyM) over and over and over again. Can you tell?

Within the hearth the large metal box glowed faintly red around its bottom edges. Felicity opened it and pulled the wool blanket out of the warmer with a mitt. It was two weeks after Solstice, and the house was still stuffy from the heat of the day, but Adalbert battled arthritis in his fingers and back, and he needed some relief if he was to get any sleep tonight. She brought the blanket over to his couch and tucked it in around him. He smiled up at her, his brown eyes softening.

“Thank you,” he said. “Have you finished your studying for the evening?”

“I have another section in the Chronicles to finish,” she said, “and I have a runic poem to translate, but it’s not urgent.”

Adalbert gave her a stern look. “Felicity, you must never think that your studies are optional. All of this hasn’t been a whim for me. I need to ensure you have the knowledge you need to be the steward Karelia must have, and for that you have to remain disciplined.”

“I know, Dally,” she said. “And I _am_ studying. You see me reading every night. But Karelia has you, and you already know everything about the library. You can read all of the tongues. Archangel Waldhar is gone, so there’s no call for research. You can relax.”

“No, no,” Adalbert said, putting a hand on her arm. “This would be the worst time to relax, least of all my guard. Don’t you see? A librarian has power under an archangel because of his skills. No matter how bad a ruler he is, the librarian has only one man to satisfy. When Zvyozda’s angels are battling each other over who may rule, however, a librarian is but a tool to be fought over and used.”

Felicity raised her eyebrows. “Battling? No one is battling,” she said. “Except for the attacks by the Skalvians way far away on the edges of Karelia. The castle and the city inside are quiet.”

“They aren’t quiet. Under the hush of waiting, dozens of things are happening. If you listen, you can hear them. But I don’t want you to listen. I want you to study.” He slid his hand down and squeezed hers tightly. “You’re still doing as I instructed you?”

She sighed. “No one knows, Dally. I study here at night in a room with no windows. I enter the library only through the secret corridors. I’ve told no one what I know or what I can do.”

“And with the other girls - you try to be the same as them?”

“We only talk of boys or gossip. I don’t think anyone suspects I have a single important thought in my head.”

Adalbert bobbed his head up and down sharply. “That’s good. That’s how it has to be. I know you don’t like it, but you understand why.”

“Because of Radek,” she said, placing her hand gently over his. “Because the angels took him.”

“He wasn’t even sixteen yet,” Adalbert said. He removed his glasses and rubbed his nose. “They had no reason to conscript him, and no one else died in that skirmish. They took him because I was training him, and the angels don’t like to share their power with humans.”

“But you have a new angel trainee,” she said. “Anton. And he is writing down the secrets of the library at the angels’ demand. So there will be no more secrets.”

“We need to be prepared for when he finishes,” he said. “I believe they suspect that I am not sharing all of the library’s secrets with Anton, and I need to make sure they _do not_ suspect I’ve shared them with you.”

“But you are sharing all the secrets with Anton, aren’t you, Dally? He’s trying his best, and he’s serious and studious.”

“He may be studious,” Adalbert said, “but he’s an angel, not a man, and that is everything. It’s because of that that I haven’t shared certain sections of the library with him or taught him all of the tongues. I’ve taught that only to you, so you must tell me you’ve done everything I’ve asked. Tell me, Felicity.”

“I’ve been careful, Dally. All of this time I’ve told no one. I’ve been the simple girl you told me to be,” Felicity said, walking to the dinner table and beginning to clear the dishes there. She turned to look at him again. “You’re beginning to frighten me. You don’t believe we’re safe?”

“We are at war on two fronts, my dear,” Adalbert said. “No one is safe, least of all humans with secrets.”

 

>>\--->

  
The last echoing notes came from Zemlya’s tower far across the city, as Tommy stepped back from the window and took in a deep breath. To sing the ancient words into the new day’s light always felt comforting in a way he didn’t fully understand.

He stood within the highest tower of the Ogon clan’s enclave in Zvyozda. The sun was rising, a bright ball of color in the east, but it was still early. Far below him townspeople were setting up the Friday market. The entire quarter was crowded with people and livestock. Their rural clansmen who had fled their farms and taken refuge within the castle were living in every habitable part of Ogon’s walls. He watched a girl help an old woman up from a pallet in an alleyway, sticking her head of dark curls underneath the woman’s arm and bracing her small legs. Tommy smiled.

Behind him his father cleared his throat, and Tommy jumped. “Three hundred years ago when our ancestors met their defeat at the swords of the Skalvians, they were made to pay the harsh tribute that’s been a burden ever since. For years the Karelians struggled to satisfy it, fighting with each other over who should have what share of the burden and how to punish shirkers. In response Archangel Randulf separated the city and the country into four parts and created clans out of the peoples of Karelia. Each clan had the responsibility to meet one quarter of the tribute, and city and country folk were expected to work together to achieve this.”

Tommy sighed. This was nothing he and the rest of Karelia hadn’t heard before a thousand times, but his father had his obsession and would be heard.

“This is important, Tommy. This is this history of your people. If you do not know--”

“I know, Father, I know: if you do not know what has happened, you cannot know what _will_ happen.”

“Yes, so _listen_. The years when a clan could not meet its quarter, one of two things has always happened: the poorest members starved that winter or the richest members paid other clans for their grain and livestock. It varied based on which angels were in power, but the overall result of the forming of the clans was less starvation and more cooperation to meet a common goal.”

Tommy folded his arms and said, “‘And in the summer, city children go to work in the country, and when rural children came of age and needed to marry or apprentice, they ask their city cousins. We are all family now after all these years of paying the tribute together.’ What is your point?”

“ _My point is_ that, as you know, Randulf put the angels over the men to shepherd and protect them from their own foolishness and childish desires, and we have been doing that ever since. Except you aren’t doing anything. It’s time for you to stop amusing yourself and fill the position your birthright has set down for you - which is not to occasionally sing the hours.”

“Except for me? I’m hardly the only angel not on the council or in active leadership.”

“You’re accomplishing nothing with your life except for making more human bastards and passing out in the gutter at night.”

“Passing out in the gutter? That was twice, Father - five years ago! And as for my bastards, you would have been happy enough if they’d turned out to be angels.”

Tommy should have been immune to Malcolm’s cold stare by now, but it still made something inside him quail. He turned away and looked out across the walls of the city. The different quarters, Veter, Voda, and Zemlya, were coming to life as well, and below, in Ogon’s square, a woman was ducking out her front door: Felicity.

Malcolm put his hand on Tommy’s shoulder, and, with effort, Tommy managed to avoid flinching at his father’s touch. He focused instead on Felicity’s long braid and how it swung when she walked. Golden strands curled around her face and her ears. She had such a serious look on her face. What need did such a pretty woman have to be so serious?

“You should marry,” Malcolm said, and Tommy jerked his head around.

“I beg your pardon,” he said. “What?”

“This autumn. Find a bride. There are a number of unmarried women of good blood amongst our set now. Choose one and announce it. I’m past done paying for you to fritter your time away drinking and playing. Marry by fall harvest, or you’ll make your way on your own funds. It’s past time you showed what you are capable of doing for Zvyozda and Ogon.”

“And what if I don’t care for any of our angel girls?”

“Caring isn’t necessary, but doing your duty is.”

Tommy gave his father a hard look, and turned back to his view, but Felicity was gone now. Instead two dogs were fighting in the square, and the woman and her granddaughter were carefully making their way around them.

“Two months, son,” Malcolm said. “That’s what you have to prove your intentions and safeguard the inheritance you’ve always taken for granted as yours.”

“I’m your only child,” Tommy said.

“Do not doubt me,” Malcolm said. “I’d rather gift my entire estate to the old hag down there than to an unworthy successor, blood or not.” And with that, he turned and left the tower.

 

  
>>\--->

 

Felicity was working on a translation of Skalvian war narrative in her bedroom when her maid climbed the stairs to tell her she had a caller. There were a number of troublesome terms in this section, and Dally would only help her with them if she put the book right in front of his face, so she was trying her hardest to decipher what she could. The first time Yasna knocked Felicity ignored it, hoping she might go away. Sadly, that didn’t happen.

“It’s an _angel_ , ma’am,” Yasna said, rapping again on the door.

“An angel?” Felicity stiffened and closed the tome, placing it within the bedside drawer. “Which one?”

“Angel Thomas.”

Felicity sighed. He was going to be a problem, she could tell. Considered a high compliment to any human, angel attention could not easily be rebuffed. She grabbed a shawl and wrapped herself in it as she hurried down two flights of stairs to their visiting room. When she cracked open the door, she saw that the back of Angel Thomas’s dark head was bent to examine the shakhmati game in progress on the central table. He looked up at the noise, and she pasted a smile on her face.

"Do you play?" he asked, turning gracefully on his heel.

"Me? Oh, no. That's a man's pastime, there's too much strategizing," she said, perusing her last move, which, in retrospect, seemed a less sound choice than she’d originally thought.

"I agree," he said, white teeth flashing in a quick smile. "My father is always trying to get me to play and better my game, but I don't see the point."

" _My_ father says that a sharp mind is a tool you can take with you anywhere," Felicity said.

"Very wise, I'm sure," Angel Thomas said and his dimple deepened as his smile overtook his face. It took all of her focus not to press her lips together. No doubt he would take it as an invitation to kiss her, she thought.

"Did you have a specific reason for your call today?" she asked in as sweet a tone as she could manage. "We have never been graced by your presence here before. Our home is not much of an angel hub, as I’m sure you must have heard."

He raised a black eyebrow at her and flicked his gaze to a backless bench. It was the only piece of furniture in the room suitable for an angel, although it was still too low, of course. His wings would drag on the floor. "May I?" he asked.

Felicity sighed. "Of course," she said and crossed the room to ring the bell. When Yasna arrived she asked, "Can I offer you some refreshments or an herbal drink? I’m afraid our options are not as extensive as what you must have at your own home. I apologize."

"Whatever you have," he said, seating himself. "I don't wish to be a burden.”

"Some chai," Felicity said to Yasna who nodded and left the room. She perched on the arm of Dally’s chair beside the fireplace. "So what can we do for you, Angel Thomas?"

He was strangely restive, twisting his hands in his lap. "I’m here because I believe you can solve a problem for me. My father wants to see me married."

She stilled. "I'm afraid we do not know each other so well," she said, "that I would be able to advise you as to any of your future plans."  

Thomas leaned forward and rested his elbows on his knees. “May I be direct?"

"Please do."

"The fact is, I don't wish to be married at all, but my father is pressing the issue and plans on disinheriting me if I don't do as he directs. So I've decided that my best option is to choose a woman to whom he will violently object. Then perhaps we may avoid the whole thing."

"We?"

"Yes, Felicity. I've chosen you as my..." he waved a hand, “intended bride.”

"Me?" Against her will her hand rose to her chest. "But I can't be an _angel's_ wife."

“Because of your low birth?” he asked. “But that’s the best part. The fact that your mother was an angel follower and your step-father is a freed slave makes you a perfect choice.”

“I wasn’t speaking of _my low birth_ ,” she said. “And my father may have been brought into the city as a slave from Westphalia, but he is the librarian now.”

“Because Waldhar is sentimental,” he said.

“Did your father tell you that? It’s because he speaks five languages and can read three more, including the Latin, Frankish, and Skalvian tongues. Can anyone else in the city do the same?”

Thomas looked like he realized he was bungling this. He put his hands up in front of his chest. “The point is, you don’t have to marry me. My father _won’t_ have it. He is obsessed with bloodlines and lineage. But if leading up to harvest festival we act as if it’s my intention to claim you, I believe he will back down on his demands.”

She stood up and walked to the window. “And where does that leave me this harvest? The jilted lover of a fickle angel? Another one of your conquests?”

He stood up and crossed to her. “I promise, I will be very respectful. I won’t treat you like just another…”

“Angel follower? Like my mother?”

“All I am saying is, when this is over, your reputation will be intact, elevated even. If I consider you bride-worthy, others certainly will after this is over.”

Felicity held two fingers to the bridge of her nose. “I am conscious of the honor you do me, Angel Thomas,” she said slowly, “but I do not wish to pretend to have a connection with you.”

“Do you mean,” he said, frowning, “that you want this to be _real_? Because that would probably complicate things. Not that being with you would be any kind of burden.” He placed his hand high on her arm and let his thumb gently caress it. “On the contrary, it will make the next weeks much more enjoyable.” He leaned in closer, dimpling, smiling, until she could see the black whiskers against the pale skin of his chin in stark, hypnotic relief. She jerked away.

“That isn’t what I mean! Consorting with angels is the very last thing I want.”

He frowned. “What’s wrong with consorting with angels? Most women are happy for the opportunity. They compete with each other for the honor.”

“The honor? Of being used and discarded?”

“Of enjoying the feathered embrace.” He was still very close to her, and suddenly she was surrounded by a curtain of gray. The tip of one circled wing trailed across the ridge of her cheekbone, and the feathers there were as smooth and soft as satin. “Tell me you’ve never wondered what it was like. You’d be the only one.”

“Even if...” she said, trying to pull away, to step back. His wings pushed her back towards him, though, the tension in every feather a nudge. “I’ve seen what happens to angel followers.”

The wings retracted suddenly, and she was free. “We don’t seduce them, you know. Angel followers know they will be taken care of for the rest of their lives if they produce an angel baby.”

Yes, that was right. _If_ they produced an angel. If a human baby resulted from a liaison with an angel, the outcome was very different. She’d watched her friend Kalina cry her eyes out when Anton had finished with her, frightened to death that she was pregnant. Felicity suspected she had been because she married the butcher shortly thereafter and her daughter, sweet but decidedly not angelic, was born a few months later.

“And how many of your lovers have produced an angel for you?”

Tommy narrowed his eyes at her. “Angel babies are rare,” he said. “Rare, but very precious. Some women are very happy to take their chances.”

Felicity nodded. “And what could be better than living out the rest of your days in an angel harem?”

“Exactly.”

“Separated from your child after weaning and forever after neither fish nor fowl.”

“Yes, well,” he said, “that doesn’t have to be your fate, you’ll be glad to know. All I require of you is the next two months of your time.”

She stepped into his body and pushed her hand against the velvet tunic covering his angel’s heart. “I’m afraid I have to decline the honor you do me, Angel Thomas. Perhaps if you begin searching now, you will be able to find another low born, illegitimate woman who would be thrilled to help you fool your father into believing your standards have plummeted. Good luck to you.”

Thomas gently peeled her hand off his chest and held it up to his mouth. “Felicity, I don’t need your consent for this. I asked you as a courtesy, but I am the only son of the ruling head of Ogon clan. I’m telling you what I require of you as my vassal. We can come to terms about what exactly you would like from this relationship, but until the harvest festival, you will behave as my intended.”

He pulled away from her and opened the door to the hallway. Poor Yasna was standing there frozen holding the chai pot and cups on a tray. Angel Thomas nodded to her, ducked through the door, and stepped into the hall, his gray wings trailing behind him on the stone floor.


	4. You Can Never Go Home Again

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Oliver returns to a drastically different Zvyozda than the one he remembered.

Oliver and Barry traveled the nearly two thousand versts from Celestia to Zvyozda over the course of a fortnight, flying over the lowlands and the rolling mountain ranges of the Empire of Angels by day and sleeping in angel temples or abandoned caves when they could find them and under the wide sky when they could not. Barry was a quick flyer and had seemingly endless energy. He was also continually fascinated by all of the details of the changing landscape.

Oliver had traveled this distance in the opposite direction once before, of course, but the terror and confusion of that time had served to erase most of his memories of it. He couldn’t imagine that he and Thea had camped out in the open, sleeping on rough pallets or even bare earth with their mother, but perhaps it had happened.

He thought again of Moira with her perfectly coiffed hair and her embroidered silks and wondered for the first time how much of that had been a response to whatever he wasn’t remembering now.

They passed over the Crooked Forest and, beyond that, Lake Ladoga, where Oliver’s family kept a house and Oliver had spent many happy summers. He wished they had time to stop and see if his Baba still lived there, but they did not. Several hours later Oliver signalled to Barry to land near a small grove of trees with a clear pond, and he descended slowly, sliding his feet onto a carpet of moss. They hadn’t seen any structures except isolated farms since crossing into Karelia, and daylight was fading quickly. He pulled the straps of his satchel off his shoulders, unbuckled it, and slid it down his front, letting it drop to the ground.

Barry landed beside him, smiling. “It’s good to be in home territory again,” he said. “Not that it wasn’t exciting to see everything else, but I’m glad we’re through the lowlands. The moisture in the air there made it harder to fly.”

“Haven’t you ever been outside of Karelia before?” Oliver asked.

“No, never,” Barry said. “I’ve read about it in the scrolls and studied the topography of the empire on maps in school, but I’ve never traveled before now.” He pulled off his own satchel and began rummaging through it. Oliver started looking around for firewood. It had been a hot day, but the night would be cooler, and a fire offered some protection from anything lurking in the dark.

“So how did you become Malcolm’s choice for this mission if you’d never been away from home before?”

“When the angels from southern Karelia flew to us after the Skalvians invaded, the Council of Angels held a general meeting so the angels could let us know what had happened to the villages there and the destruction and violence they were inflicting as they advanced. Malcolm asked for volunteers to fly to the capital. I’m fast,” Barry said, “And it seemed urgent, getting help from Celestia. I didn’t know that they…”

“Wouldn’t care?” Oliver asked, tossing a pile of small sticks on the ground next to a small hollow with what looked like ashes inside. He looked around. Was this a common camping spot?

“...wouldn’t have any officer or ambassador dedicated to these sorts of problems in the provinces.” Barry, having found his flint, knelt and began to lay out a pyramid from the sticks.

“And you thought it was a good idea to come alone?”

“There was another angel, Milo. We were supposed to travel together, but at the last minute he fell sick and wasn’t replaced.”

“You didn’t petition Malcolm to appoint someone else?”

“Oh, Malcolm’s not my clan head,” Barry said. “I’m not a member of Ogon.”

“Which clan are you in then? Who is your clan head?”

“I’m in Zemlya,” Barry said. “So I suppose that would make my clan head... _you_.”

Oliver felt his eyebrows raise. This raised so many questions. He wasn’t sure which of them to address first. He led with the most pressing.

“Zemlya clan has no head? For how long?”

Barry folded his hands and stared at them. “After your grandfather passed, your uncle Theodor took the mantle of clan head, but then he died in a hunting accident. And Waldhar became clan head until he was elected Archangel by the Council of Angels. After that no one stepped forward. And since Waldhar went out to parley with the Skalvians, much of the clan cooperation more or less collapsed, with the exception of Malcolm, and the new head of Veter, Hugo.”  

“And Malcolm had the authority to send you on behalf of Zvyozda?”

“Not officially,” Barry said. “But he’s been performing all of the duties of the archangel anyway in Waldhar’s absence.”

Oliver ran his tongue along his teeth as he pieced his way through this information. Malcolm was acting as archangel in all but name, and he’d sent Barry on what was, at very least, a fool’s errand and quite possibly a death sentence.

“Do you know why Malcolm might consider you a threat?”

Barry put a hand to his chest. “Me? I’m certain he doesn’t.”

“I haven’t set eyes on Malcolm for 15 years,” Oliver said, “but I’ll tell you, if my mother advises us to watch him, and he sent you alone to Celestia - where angels frequently go missing or die in the clan wars - we have to tread lightly around him.”

“Malcolm sponsored me in angel school after my father died,” Barry said. “I trust him.”

“I don’t,” Oliver said. “The first lesson you learn in Celestia is, ‘Trust no one.’ My mother credits her Celestian childhood for her ability to keep her children alive. She had us training with assassins almost the first day we arrived there.”

“Your sister trained with assassins?” Barry asked.

“That’s life in the capital,” Oliver said. “Now let’s get this fire going. I should do one more fly-over before we settle in for the night.”

 

>>\--->

 

At the sound of a twig snapping, Barry opened his eyes. The fire in the hollow had died down to embers, and it was still night, but the stars overhead shed their light and the moon illuminated the camp site. To his left he saw them, two men crouched low and creeping towards his pallet. One of them had a long, sharp knife. Barry froze, but Oliver leapt from his pallet in an instant, springing into the air with the force of a gale.

The moon shone through his pale, iridescent wings and, as if in a trance, Barry watched him as his feet kicked the one man in the throat, felling him with the force of his weight. Oliver landed and bounced off the ground, kicking the other man in the chest before he reached Barry. The knife hit the ground and skittered toward the fire. Oliver grabbed for it and whirled around, intent on subduing the second man.

“Wait!” Barry yelled, sitting up.

Oliver stilled, the knife hovering above the assailant’s heart. He turned back to Barry. Oliver’s face was a canvas of beauty and violence in the moonlight, the bloodlust in his eyes shining. The angles of his cheekbones were slashes that paralleled the blade of the knife.

“We can’t learn anything from him if he’s dead,” Barry said.

Oliver moved the knife from the man’s heart to his neck, his posture shifting with his intentions. His shoulders loosened and his wings retracted from their full spread. Just then, the man pulled a second knife out of his vest and pushed it up towards Oliver’s groin, but Oliver evaded it and broke the man’s neck in one fluid movement.

Barry sighed. “I suppose questioning him and taking him to the nearest tribunal were out of the question?”

“The penalty for assaulting an angel is death,” Oliver said. “I should have seen what we could get out of him, though.”

“Criminals don’t go to the tribunal in the capital?”

“Men go to the tribunal when they attack other men. Not when they attack angels. There is no point in wasting the judges’ time.”

Barry looked at him.

“It’s still early,” Oliver said. “I’m going to see if I can get some more rest before we fly to Zvyozda tomorrow.”

“You can sleep?” Barry asked. “After that?”

“They drill you in the angel corps to be alert even in sleep.”

“We can’t reach the castle before sundown,” Barry said. “And we will not be allowed to fly into the city after dark.”

“We’re not entering through whatever authorized channels they have now in Zvyozda,” Oliver said. Barry’s surprise must have registered on his face because Oliver said, “You do as you like. I’m going in through the tunnels in the mountain. There are ones that lead to Zemlya and our house. I’d prefer it if no one knew I’d arrived for a few days, so I’ll take the way in through the back passages.”

“Why?” Barry asked. “Do you think they’ll deny you entrance?”

“No,” Oliver said. “But with the Skalvians’ advance and Malcolm’s choices, I want to observe the castle before anyone knows I’ve returned.”

“What do you think I should do?” Barry asked.

“Remain with me for now,” Oliver said. “No one can harm you if they don’t know where you are.”

 

>>\--->

 

Oliver skulked around the edges of the Zemlya square. It should have been hard for an angel to go unseen in this crowd of men and women, but he had a lot of practice living in the shadows, and it was quite dark. He was also wearing the jacket he’d had specially designed to cover his retracted wings. In full light it made him look slightly hunchbacked, but at night he could pass for human - which was his goal now. He was looking for a way into the tavern he’d heard existed but had never seen - a place it was rumored no angels were allowed.

Oliver had been in Zvyozda for three days and had learned little of use. Barry was still camped out in his father’s study reading the books and scrolls Robert had collected on the history of the Empire of Angels and some sketches he’d drawn of the flora and fauna in Karelia. There was nothing in his father’s papers, however, that could tell Oliver what the problems were in Karelia right now. From his previous nighttime patrols Oliver had learned that people were on edge, and that angels seemed to either be secretive or somewhat out of control. He’d seen a few of his childhood friends carousing through the streets, wings dragging on the ground, their arms slung over girls who seemed too young or inexperienced to be angel followers.

Every night he’d explored a different quarter, and there were disparities in how well they functioned, even if they were subtle. Voda was the most like he remembered castle life being. In fact, Maximilian, the clan head he remembered from childhood, still held sway there. The quarter was well patrolled, and none of the refugees from the countryside were living on the streets. They’d all been given places to stay.

Zemlya, his own home, was the opposite. It was clear no one was in charge. The streets were poorly maintained and full of beggars and the homeless. The gate guards slept on duty, and petty thievery flourished. He would not be at all surprised to learn that other forms of crime had gotten out of hand as well. This realization was a sad welcome home.

In Veter things were either very good or horrible. The new clan head, Hugo, had taken residence in what had been Oliver’s father’s friend’s house. Hugo’s father, Hartwin, had died fifteen years ago when a Skalvian axe severed his head from his neck, but Oliver barely remembered Hugo. He’d been so much older.

Behind him and to his left a door opened, and two women stepped out into the dark. He turned and saw a long blonde braid slapping against the back of a green cloak. The woman with the braid put her hand on the other woman’s arm. “Thank you for walking me home, Kalina, but how will you get back safely?”

Kalina put a finger to her lips. “Hush. Don’t worry about me. I’m not afraid of angels. After everything, I should _think not_.”

The other woman groaned. “You of all people should know better. I’ll worry, though. Will you put your lantern in your window so I can look out and see that you’ve returned safely?”

“ _Felicity_ ,” Kalina said. “Don’t tell me they’ve got you scared? These mad women with their deranged campaign?”

“Well, yes.” Felicity said. “I have my own reasons to be careful too.” She looked around, and Oliver got a quick glimpse of how lovely her face was.

Kalina shrugged. “Worry for yourself if you must, but don’t worry about me. I can take care of myself, but I can’t put the lantern in my window because I won’t be home right away.”

Felicity stopped walking. “No,” she said. “Don’t tell me--”

“I’m going to the Three Owls,” Kalina said.

“But Ludek, he’ll be waiting. And what about Gosia? She’s only two months old.”

“My mother-in-law is rocking Gosia to sleep in our bedroom right now, content in her knowledge that she’s so much better at mothering than I am,” Kalina said. “And Ludek is already asleep, resting up for another day of hammering iron.” She slipped her arm through Felicity’s and tugged her in the direction they’d been walking before.

“He’s a good man,” Felicity said.

“He’s a dull man,” Kalina said. “Good, but dull.”

“Kalina--”

“I don’t need your advice. You’re my heart, Felicity, but you haven’t spent the last two months nursing and sleeping and changing diapers. I need some excitement. I need to drink a little okavita and dance to the fiddle. I promise you I won’t go home with anyone. The Three Owls doesn’t even allow angels inside, so you have nothing to worry about.”

Kalina practically pushed her friend toward the door of the house they’d reached. “Now you be the good girl I’m not, and go to bed,” she said.

In the moonlight, Oliver could see the set of Felicity’s smooth jaw. She was preparing another argument. Kalina leaned in and kissed her cheeks. “Ludek won’t even know,” she said. “Good night.”

Felicity gave her friend a frown but then kissed her back and went inside. Kalina turned sharply and began making her way to Zemlya’s stables. Oliver followed her from a distance until she reached the stable entrance. A couple of young people were milling around, but when they saw Kalina they waved her off. “It’s full,” the man said. “You’ll have to wait to get in - but someplace else. We can’t attract angel notice.”

Kalina made a rude motion, but wandered off to find a place within sight distance to wait. This was Oliver’s cue. Whatever was on the other side of the stable door he had to see, and Kalina was his pass inside. He slowly worked his way around the street, careful not to attract attention. There were a surprising number of people hidden in the shadows here and there, waiting. Every so often the stable door opened and someone would approach and disappear.

As he neared the spot where Kalina was standing, he tripped and fell into her. Oliver had experience with angel followers; every angel did. Some of them liked the novelty, and some of them played the odds hoping to produce an angel child and increase their social position. A smaller percentage of them just couldn’t help themselves. Whatever it was about angels - their strength, their physical prowess, their stamina, their size - it was like a drug, and they had to have it. They weren’t social climbers, and the flying was a perk but not a draw. They craved a physically overpowering sexual experience.

Kalina was one of these.

As Oliver fell, he slid his body down hers before he caught himself. Kalina grunted as his weight slammed into her. “What do you think you’re doing?” she asked, her head snapping up at him, but then his hands grasped her waist and righted her on her feet, pushing her weight back against the wall. She tilted her head to get a better look at him, and, yes, there was that spark. This woman might not know him, she might not know he was an angel, but some part of her was physically picking up on what his body had just told hers.

He was in.

Kalina smiled and she trailed a hand up her side as she relaxed her posture, leaning towards him. “I’m sorry,” she said. “Have we’ve met before?”

“I don’t think so,” he said. “I’ve only come to Zvyozda recently, and I’m sure I would remember you if we had.” Oliver had occasionally, with the more aggressive angel followers, pushed the conversation steadily into the ridiculous in an effort to judge if all they needed was his angel body. Then he remembered what the blond woman had said and shook his head. This wasn’t a game, and he wasn’t going to toy with her, even if she auditioned to be his plaything. All he needed was to get into the Three Owls, take a look around, and then get out.

He looked down into Kalina’s face and saw how drawn it was. There were dark circles under her almond shaped eyes. Beneath her excitement, she was exhausted. She wouldn’t make it past a second round of drinks, and then he’d make sure she got home. But right now he needed her.

“I’ve heard there’s a place around here. I spent the day with my relatives, and I could really use a drink.”

“You’re not the only one,” she said, grimacing. “There is a place. You can wait with me. The man at the door pressed a circle into my hand.” She opened her palm and showed him a piece of simply carved wood. “They’ll open the stable door and hold a shape in front of the torch there. When it’s your shape, you can go in. If you pass inspection.”

“Inspection?”

“Well, they don’t allow angels, of course, but they’ll also turn away drunks and rabble rousers… and people who’ve caused them trouble before.” She smiled up at him and her dark curls bobbed about her face. “Are you planning on causing trouble?”

“No, lovely, I am not,” Oliver said.

“Then we should be good,” she said, placing a finger on his jacket and running her nail across the embroidered silk.

“We should,” he said in an agreeable tone. “And perhaps when we’re inside, you’ll let me buy you a drink?”

“Perhaps I shall,” Kalina said.

Ten minutes later, they were inside.

 

>>\--->

 

The Three Owls was built into the mountain, and Oliver had to duck his head as he descended the carved stone stairs to the tavern. The main room looked like it might have been a storeroom once, but now the four main beams across the high ceiling supported the lamps that lit the interior of the room. There was also a carved wooden relief of each of the clans - earth, water, wind, and fire - owls cunningly worked into the design of each of them.

An enormous mural covered one wall, depicting important scenes in Karelia’s history: young men in battle, women and children singing, scaffolding on Mount Lyeda, white bearded angels sitting on the council, and the Archangel Randulf with his map of Karelia and its new clans.

And there were angels everywhere.

They weren’t real angels; instead, the waitress who took their drink order had a pair of scraggly looking wings pinned to the back of her kirtle. Effigies of three clan heads, two young and one old, hung from the rafters, their faces slathered in paint and their hair in curl papers.

Up on stage a carefully carved marionette angel lord was droning on about the duties of people to a very pretty marionette girl. When the girl marionette pulled out a cudgel and began beating the angel over the head with it, the audience cheered. They came to their feet and broke into applause when someone from behind the puppet stage squirted the crowd with a red liquid and the angel puppet collapsed dramatically.

Oliver drank his okavita slowly so that he could savor the burn in the back of his throat. Kalina had already downed two small glasses, and she was leaning over the table toward him in an increasingly seductive way, but her eyelids were drooping, and he figured he didn’t have too much time before she passed out either from the liquor or exhaustion.

“Wait here, lovely,” he said, tapping the top of the table. She pouted but rested her chin in her hands. He moved to the farthest corner of the room, next to the stage, and began his stealthy observation of the company assembled.

The group of people seemed fairly diverse: young and old, men and women, castle and country. They were socializing without motivation, and, while clearly the decor revealed some repressed hostility about angels, no one was ranting or raving on a box. This was a social gathering.

A woman stepped on stage dressed in a yellow silk kirtle and began singing a salacious ballad. The crowd turned toward the stage and began whistling. Oliver decided he’d had enough so he turned and began walking back to Kalina’s table. Before he could get out of the shadow of the stage, however, he felt something hard thrust underneath his chin. He looked down and saw a small woman dressed in dark clothing holding a staff. Her blond hair peeked out beneath the hood she was wearing, and he saw something metallic flash in her hand before she backed him against the stone wall.

“Give me a reason not to scream and bring this entire room on top of you, angel,” she said in a harsh whisper.

 

>>\--->

 

Oliver lifted his hands in a peaceful gesture and then snagged the lip of the woman’s hood so that it fell away, leaving her face uncovered. Her face was familiar - a lovely oval splashed with freckles - but her scowl was not.

“Sara?” he asked.

Her chin shot up as she focused all of her attention on his face, and she narrowed her eyes. After a moment she relaxed fractionally. “Oliver?”

He put a finger to his lips. “Shh,” he said, “no one knows I’m in Zvyozda.”

She lowered her staff and the thin metal spike she was holding, and her scowl faded. “ _What_ are you doing here? After all this time has passed? We thought you were never coming back.”

Oliver lowered his hand to her shoulder and glanced about him. “Not here,” he said. “Are you still in the house on the square? With your father? I have to get this woman home. We can talk after.”

She gave him a long look and said, “I’ll come with you.”

“It’s late, Sara. Let whoever escorted you here walk you home.”

“I escorted myself, Oliver, and I’ll see this girl home. That’s why I’m here - to save women like her from their own stupidity.”

Oliver raised his eyebrows but nodded and said nothing. He dropped his hand from her shoulder and indicated she walk ahead of him back to the table. When he reached it, he saw that Kalina was nearly asleep. “Time to go,” he said, taking her by one arm.

“Where we going?” she asked as she rose. She put her hand on his stomach and leaned in. “Where’s home, angel?”

“We’re taking you to _your home_ , Kalina,” Sara said. “Where your husband and daughter are waiting for you.”

Kalina turned to look at Sara, frowning. “Why’s she here?” she asked Oliver.

“She insisted on coming,” he said, removing her hand and taking her by the elbow. “Now we need to get out of here.” He pulled her out of the hall and all but carried her up the stairs. Sara made a sound of disapproval, but followed them up. Once they were out on the street, Kalina made one last protest.

“I don’t want to go home,” she said, pouting.

“We don’t care what you wa--” Sara said.

Oliver put a hand up. “Cherub,” he said, “I need to go, and I can’t on my honor leave you there alone.”

Kalina tugged at his jacket. “Fly me home?”

Oliver decided to satisfy his curiosity. “What gave me away?” he asked.

She smiled up at him. “Nothing,” she said. “Everything? Only angels make me want to drown _and_ fly.”

Sara made a noise of disgust and unbelief, and Kalina waved a hand at her. “Can’t we get rid of her? She’s only going to make your night worse. I’ll make it better, I promise. So much better.”

“My apologies,” he said, “but that’s not how this night’s going to end. Sara?” He turned to her.

“This way,” Sara said, walking quickly. She led them through the narrow cobbled streets, back to the square then indicated the house. “There.”

“Good night,” Oliver said.

Kalina sighed. “It could have been,” she said and then disappeared clumsily into her house.

“And now?” Oliver asked Sara.

“Let’s go back to your house in Zemlya,” she said. “And you can explain to me why you’re back in Zvyozda.”

Oliver sighed.

 

>>\--->

 

Oliver and Sara made their way into the large Clan Zemlya residence through the back door. They entered through the kitchen, and Oliver found a rushlight, lit it, and held it aloft. He could see fine in the dark, but knew she couldn’t. He led them into a small sitting room and lit a candle with the rushlight and then placed it on a low table. He shrugged off his jacked and let his wings stretch out. When she saw them, Sara startled, and her hand went to her pocket.

Oliver stilled his wings, and after a minute she let her hand drop.

“Should I ask about your little dagger?” he said, indicating a chair for her and sitting in the one opposite.

She sat down carefully and arranged her dark skirts around herself. “Demon venom,” she said. “I carry it with me always.”

“Demon venom,” Oliver said slowly. “You know it’s a capital offense to be caught with that.”

“I know,” she said.

“A drop will incapacitate an angel, and a little more will kill, so possessing it is considered assault.”

“I know,” she said again.

He folded his hands together in his lap. “What’s going on, Sara?”

She sighed. “A lot has happened since you left,” she said slowly.

“Does it have to do with why you’re watching over women in taverns? And carrying demon venom and that huge stick?”

Sara said nothing, and finally he sighed. “I can see that there’s tension between the angels and the people of the clans.”

“If by tension you mean seething hatred and near rebellion, you’re right,” Sara said, her fingers clenching on the arms of her chair.

For a moment he didn’t speak. The house around them was silent, all of the the furniture in the room covered in sheets. A thick layer of dust lay over everything else - everything but them and the candle that burned on the table. Finally he said, “It wasn’t like this when I left.”

“You’re right, it wasn’t,” she said. “But when you left there weren’t angels preying on young women, and the angel court still offered some hope of justice.”

“The angels denied you justice?” He sat up. “For what crime?”

“For rape. There is a pair of angels who are assaulting women, and even with proof, the angel court refuses to do anything about it.”

“Who are they? I can look into it,” Oliver said. “I’ve been told that I am - or will be - de facto head of Zemlya now.”

“I don’t want angel help,” she said. He opened his mouth, but she put a hand up. “Two years ago, yes, I would have taken it and been grateful for it. But we have seen what the angels are now, and it is time for _them to see_ that _we_ are not weak. We are not helpless, and we will have our human justice.”

There was something about her words that made him uneasy in a way he hadn’t been in a long, long time. He had always assumed that life in Zvyozda would go on as it had when he was little, with its small problems and provincial troubles. There would be clan rumblings over who ran the city, and a few young angels might get cocky and have to be taken down a peg by the council. He hadn’t expected that when he returned angels and humans would have daggers drawn and the castle leadership would have fractured.

“Do you remember when we used to play together?” he asked, closing his eyes.

“I remember you as the leader of your pack of young angels,” she said. “You were always getting into trouble and my father was always putting a stop to it.”

He smiled. “The Avenging Host. We took ourselves _very seriously_. Your father got so exasperated with me because you tagged along with us wanting to be included. You said when you grew up you were going to be an angel avenger. We told you it didn’t work that way, but you didn’t believe us.”

“I forgot about that,” she said, her voice dropping. “That’s another thing that has definitely changed. I no longer want to be an angel.” After another minute she asked, “So why _are_ you back in Zvyozda?”

“To find out what went wrong,” he said, opening his eyes, “and set it right. I promised my father I would, and I put it off long enough. I’m here to discover what happened fifteen years ago, and why my father was killed.”

“So you’re not just visiting, then?” she asked.

  
“No,” he said. “I’m here to stay, and I intend to get to the bottom of all of this.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So far there are two original characters in this story who have really come alive for me: Adabert and Kalina. Please let me know what you think of Kalina here. I'm very curious.


	5. "You are cordially invited to an angel party"

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Felicity receives an invitation to a party she'd rather not attend, and Oliver makes a dramatic entrance.

In the beginning of the week following the new moon Felicity sat down for breakfast, a ring was waiting for her on her plate, next to her bowl of kasha and milk. It was a large yellow topaz - the jewel of the clan of Ogon - in a heavy gold setting.

“Yasna,” she called. When the maid came, she asked, “What’s this?”

Yasna grimaced. “Bronek brought it by this morning.”

“Bronek? Why would he bring… This is an invitation, isn’t it?”

“I believe so,” Yasna said. “From Angel Thomas. Bronek acts as his boy.”

“And what am I being ‘invited’ to?”

Yasna looked around the room, at the fireplace, at Felicity’s untouched bowl.

“First harvest,” Felicity finally said. “It’s Friday, the angels’ celebration of it, at least. And now _I_ must go.” She drummed her fingers on the wooden table. “Did Bronek tell you anything else?”

Yasna nodded quickly. “He said you were to dress to make an impression.”  

“An impression,” Felicity said, thinking. She hadn’t expected too much of the holiday this year since the countryside was under siege. Normally by this time in the summer, she and Adalbert had made their way to their small dacha in Ryn village and would be hard at work gathering, pickling, and drying their vegetables for winter. Dally was an expert fisherman, and the lake nearby was cold and deep. His hobby supplemented their diet summer and winter.

First harvest in the country was one of her favorite holidays. The villagers of Ryn would have a huge communal feast. They would dig a wide hole in the ground and pour ale into it, then search for mushrooms in the forest, light bonfires, and drink and sing long into the night. The height of summer wasn’t the best time to find them, but a good mushroom harvest was a sign of the favor of Matka Zemlya, so everyone, even the smallest children, searched high and low. Matka was a loving goddess, their earth mother, and she did not require sacrifices of either animals or grains, but she did like to be appreciated and loved. It was important to take time to honor her, even during this busy season, because she was the one who provided for them.

This year there would be no laughing searches. Felicity would not have to show any of the smaller village children how to conceal their knives so the mushrooms would not be afraid of their approach and hide. She was trapped here in Zvoyzda, and apparently she was going to an angel dance. She snorted. The angels didn’t care about Matka or the other gods. Up until the Skalvians had reaped them a decade and a half ago, they had hardly observed any of the feasts. But after so much death and chaos, many of them had become frightened and were now observing the rites - without any of the dirt or sweat they usually involved, of course.

“Can you bring me my mother’s dresses from storage?” Felicity asked. “I need to see what I have to choose from.”

“I will, right away.”

Yasna ducked out of the room and Felicity heard her footsteps on the stairs. A few minutes later she was back, carrying a large cedar box. She placed it on the table next to Felicity’s now empty plate and opened it. Inside there was a mass of fabric.

Felicity’s mother had been a bit famous as an angel follower. Born in a small village in west Karelia, she’d traveled to Zemlya for the opportunity to meet angels. Her parents had disowned her for this. They’d actually petitioned their clan, Zemlya, to cast Donna out when Felicity was born and no father had come forward to claim her. This story was not uncommon, sadly. There were too many girls who gambled on angels and lost, but Donna had been unique. Stunningly beautiful with shining golden hair and enormous blue eyes, Donna had a small frame that was both graceful and very feminine. When she’d arrived at Zemlya, she’d had her pick of angels, and they had showered her with gifts. She’d had her own house and her own clothes and jewels - but no husband and the contempt of angel and human women alike.

“The ones on top are the linen, miss,” Yasna said, lifting them out and brushing cedar shavings from them. “Then the silks.”

Angels wore linen and silk. Because they were less affected by the extremities of temperature, they could wear thinner fabrics all year round - and did. Both linen and silk were far more expensive to make or procure, so a typical angel wardrobe was a proclamation of wealth and status. In fact, there were ancient dress laws disallowing human women from wearing certain fabrics. These didn’t apply to beautiful mistresses of high-ranking angels, of course.

Donna had worn the streamlined angel fashions well, but darker wools cut into the more figure-fitting human fashions had suited her better. Those were the dresses Felicity remembered her mother wearing, and some of them were the dresses she wore now that she was grown and could fit into them.

Yasna finished folding the contents of the box and then pulled out one last piece. Felicity gasped. It was _the_ dress. Her mother’s wedding dress. She took it from Yasna and stroked it. She hadn’t see this in years, but here it was again, as beautiful, soft, and as warm as it had ever been.

Cut from wine red wool and ornamented with polished amber stones around the neckline, the narrowly cut kirtle was embroidered at its base with an image of Mokosh, the handmaiden of Matka Zemlya, between two horses.  Donna had worn it as a symbol of her decision to re-embrace her heritage and her new husband and, with Mokosh’s help, have more children and keep a happy house. It was, in a very real sense, her public rejection of angels and their values.

Felicity had held her mother’s hand on the way to the ceremony and on the long way back to Dally’s house in Ogon. Her mother had closed the door to her house on Cloud Hill and never looked back. But Felicity had. She’d stumbled down the steps that morning, her eyes still on that yellow door.

Donna had grabbed her face in her hands and said, “Felicity, we have a new life now, but _don’t you forget_ where you came from. Someday the angels will know what they had in you and weep for its loss. But now it’s time to see Dally.” And off they’d gone. Donna had strode through the whole castle on her way to the wedding wearing that red dress, then she’d taken her vows on the steps of the barbican.

Felicity’s life could be split into two parts: the day before the red dress, and all the days after that day. As she thought about her mother and her unbending pride and will, she knew exactly what she would wear as a guest to the angels’ first harvest party. It would be her pleasure to let all of Zvyozda see it once more.

 

>>\--->

 

When Oliver saw Barry the next day, his thick brown hair was matted with dust and he was following a line of text in the book in his hand with one finger. Oliver wondered if he’d even moved from this room since the last time he’d seen him.

“Barry,” he said from the doorway. “Barry!”

Barry looked up, startled, and he had to juggle a bit not to drop the book. “Um, yes, Oliver?” he said, swiping at his forehead with one hand and leaving a smudge.

“The last time I saw you, you looked exactly like this. Have you eaten? Don’t you want to clean yourself up? There’s fresh water in the cistern now. I pumped it in.”

“Oh,” Barry said. “I had some bread this morning, I think. Your books here are so interesting. I didn’t know your father kept a library.”

“Well, it’s not a formal collection,” Oliver said, straightening from where he’d been leaning against the doorway and walking in the room. “Just a few books that he brought back from Celestia on subjects he was interested in. Plus a few of his own writings. I’m not sure what’s there exactly. I’ve never read them.”

Barry’s eyes widened. “You’ve never _read_ them? There’s a whole set of scrolls devoted to fantastical beasts that live beyond the White Sea. They’re subdivided by category and species.”

“Fascinating,” Oliver said. He moved a few books from a stool and sat down. “Barry, do you know what’s going on in Zvyozda?”

“What’s going _on_?” Barry asked.

“Between the humans and the angels. Something is very wrong. Haven’t you noticed?”

Barry put down his book and wrinkled his forehead. “If you’re talking about the price of bread or the problem with the curfew--”

“No, not the bread and not the curfew. Apparently, there have been angels raping women, and the court is refusing to punish them.”

“Where did you hear that?”

“My friend Sara told me,” Oliver said.

“Sara. Is that who you had here last night? Is she your…”

“Sara’s my friend. We played together when we were kids, and I trust that if she says this is happening, it is.”

“But rape, it’s hard to prove, right?” Barry asked. “Women have always had grievances with angels. The worst angels seem to attract the most women.”

“Yes, but people no longer trust angels _in general_ and are bitterly angry at the leadership.”

Barry shrugged helplessly. “I don’t know. I haven’t seen any violent behavior or rebellion.”

“The women of this castle are carrying demon’s venom around with them, Barry. I’ve seen it.”

“Truly?” Barry’s eyes widened. “But you can’t...I can’t believe…”

Oliver waited for him to think it through. He stacked a couple of stray scrolls on his father’s carved desk.

Barry finally shrugged. “I’m not the best person to ask about women. If you want to know what’s going on with the angels, you should go to the first harvest gathering on Friday. And if you want to know what’s happening in the angel courts, you should go to the library. Adalbert keeps the records.”

“Adalbert? The librarian?” Oliver asked.

“Yes,” Barry said. “He doesn’t like angels, but he knows everything, and if you ask him politely, he will help. He always grants my requests, although you have to read everything there under his supervision. It helps if you bring him a little present. He enjoys cheese, I’ve found. Especially the rich kind.”

Oliver filed that away. Cheese? “I didn’t even know that angels celebrated first harvest.”

“They do now,” Barry said. “But it’s essentially another excuse to have a party. Don’t expect there to be any real veneration. Malcolm and the entire Council of Angels will be there.”

“Then so will I,” Oliver said. “Why don’t you go home, Barry? Get some rest and see your father. Friday is only a day away, and you can decide if you want to be associated with me after the party.”

Barry looked around, clearly torn, and Oliver realized what his dilemma was.

“Take a scroll or two with you,” he said. “Bring them back whenever you like. I won’t miss them.”

Barry smiled. “I suppose it wouldn’t hurt to eat something and clean myself off. See what’s happened since I’ve been away,” he said.

 

>>\--->

 

  
  
On Friday evening Felicity descended the stairway down to the front hall carefully so that she would not entangle her feet in the long train of her mother’s dress. It had been designed to look regal and dramatic, but there was a very real danger she might stumble and fall in it, or, worse, step on it and rip the intricate embroidery. She wondered how her mother had managed. She had always made everything she wore look so elegant.

As she turned the corner at the bottom of the steps, she saw Dally waiting for her by the door.  He was holding the topaz ring. She crossed to him and gently but firmly took it from his hand.

“Were you going to tell me about this?” he asked, motioning to the ring and her dress. His face was pink, and there was a deep crease above his bulbous nose.

“I was, Dally,” Felicity said. “But I didn’t want you to worry, and I didn’t want you to do something foolish like confront Angel Thomas or _Malcolm_.  I was going to give you all the details after the party.”

“Worry?” He threw his hands up. “Why would I worry? Because my daughter is going to an angel party dressed in her mother’s last bit of reckless rebellion?”

“It’s only a dress,” she said.

“It’s red,” Dally said. “It doesn’t get more earth-bound than that. There will be no angels in red tonight, and you know it.”

“But it’s Matka Zemlya’s holiday,” she said. “You know how important it is to observe--”

Dally put a finger over her mouth. “Felicity, I read seven languages and speak five. I’ve spent your childhood teaching you the stars and your numbers. I’m not stupid, and despite how some of them look, the angels aren’t either. You’re not wearing that dress out of religious observance. You know that gown is infamous.”

“I’m not wearing it to be rebellious,” she said, and when Dally opened his mouth she continued, “Or at least not completely. I know you think Thomas is dangerous--”

“ _Malcolm_ is dangerous,” he said. “Thomas is run-of-the-mill selfish and thoughtless. A typical angel.”

“But the reason I’m going with him is to avoid being entangled with either of them. If I can convince Malcolm of my complete unsuitability tonight, if I can persuade him to tell Thomas, ‘Anyone, _choose anyone_ but her,’ then this is all over, and we can go back to our normal lives.”

“I think you overestimate how easily this fight between Malcolm and his son will resolve itself,” Dally said.

“Thomas can’t force my hand,” she said.

“But Malcolm can,” he said. “As long as you’re a member of clan Ogon.” He looked thoughtful.

“What?” Felicity asked.

“Hmmm?” Dally said. “It’s just...it’s nothing. Now would you go and put something else on? Anything else. It’s not that you don’t look beautiful. You look so much like your mother, it breaks my heart. But there is a crate full of dresses that won’t be a direct challenge to the angels. Choose one of them.”

Felicity pushed her heel into the soft woolen carpet on the floor. “I know what I’m doing, Dally,” she said.

“I’m almost positive that’s not true,” he said.

“The dress is a statement, yes,” she said. “But I will behave. Mama tutored me extensively in manners. I will be a perfect angela tonight, I promise.”

Dally reached for her and pulled her into his side, kissing her hair. “It would be better if you didn’t poke this bear, Felicity. He has sharp claws, and you are still a child with tender skin.”

There was a knock on the front door, and Dally looked at her with pleading eyes. She stared back at him, then crossed to the door and opened it. Thomas stood on the other side, ruffling his gray wings back into place. He was dressed in a silk charcoal jacket covering a pale gray shirt embroidered with gold thread and decorated with jet beads. He looked down at Felicity, and his eyes widened.

“Good evening, Angel Thomas,” she said, making a slight curtsy. “Please come in.”

He lowered his head and entered the hall. “You’re wearing…” he said.

“My mother’s dress, I know,” Felicity said. “You requested that I make an impression.”

“I...I didn’t mean...” Thomas said.

“Perhaps next time you want something, you will request it of me directly instead of leaving your ring with my maid,” she said.

Thomas’s eyebrows raised and his gaze sharpened. “My ring. I don’t see it on you.”

Dally held it up on his hand. “Are we to take this as a legal declaration of your intent, Angel Thomas?”

“Sir,” Thomas said and licked his lips. “It’s only a trinket, a symbol of our clan and my place in it. I thought she would like to wear it.”

Felicity took the ring from Dally and pressed it in Thomas’s palm. “As our goal is to _avoid_ forming a connection, perhaps it’s better that you keep it. You don’t want a wife, and I am not your follower. Not wearing it sends that message better.”

“Very well,” Thomas said after a minute. He tucked the ring into a pocket within his jacket and then extended his hand. “We should go, or we’ll be late.”

“I want her home early,” Dally said in a low, firm voice, “Angel Thomas.”

“Yes, alright.” Thomas nodded at him and ducked his head as he went through the front door. Felicity looked back at her father and smiled. “It’ll be all right, Dally,” she said, and she pressed a kiss against his whiskers and left.

 

>>\--->

 

The angels’ first harvest party was held about as far away from the earth as it was possible to get in Karelia: on the highest terrace in Zvyozda, so high it could only be reached by flight. It was built at the base of the highest tower in the castle and extended in a long oval, its perimeter enclosed only by a low fence. Felicity intended to stay well within the center of it; she disliked heights.

Much of the kingdom was visible from this spot. In fact, in the peak of the tower, above where the angels sang the hours, was the space where the castle’s beacon had traditionally been built. It had been a long, long time since any archangel had lit the beacon, though. Dally said it was beyond living memory. Zvyozda had been constructed at the edge of the empire, with the wilderness of beyond encroaching on its back. If Zvyozda fell, the hordes would claim Karelia and the wilderness would extend itself further into angel territory. It was a sobering thought.

Thomas set them down carefully at the entrance of the terrace, his gray wings flapping once more as he steadied them, and Felicity forced herself to release her fisted hands from his clothing. She turned to the crowd, and the conversation in the courtyard slowly came to a halt like instruments in a band slowly going silent: first the drum, then the lyre, and finally the flute.

The last rays of the day’s sun spread out over the mountain top, and the sky turned from yellow to orange in the dying light. In this wash of color, clothed in her mother’s red wool, Felicity felt like Matka’s daughter, sprung from the dampness of the earth, more than she ever had before, but she stood straight and lifted her chin, determined to represent her mother and her people to these angels who would rather ignore or exploit all of them.

Thomas offered her his arm, and Felicity walked through the center of the crowd, her feet feeling each gap in the stones through her thin slippers. Thomas’s height and posture forced her to hold her spine upright, and she was oddly grateful for it. She held her head high as well. Her long hair swung back and forth as she stepped, nudging the backs of her legs through the fabric of her dress.

Furthest away, on a dias, Malcolm stood next to the other clan heads, Maximilian and Hugo. There was an intensity to the men that made Felicity wonder if they had been arguing, but as Thomas neared them, Malcolm turned and took in their approach.

At the foot of the dias Thomas bowed, and Felicity knelt in a deep curtsy, but she did not bend her neck. Malcolm tilted his head to examine her. His look left her feeling vulnerable: not naked, but exposed. His blue eyes flashed, and a very old memory surfaced from when she was a tiny girl. He was holding her and laughing as she batted her fists against his chest, finally grabbing her small hands and saying, “Shhh, Felicity. No.”

Where had that come from? It had been years since she had spoken to him even, but she could tell from his slow smile and the speculative gleam in his eyes that he knew exactly why she’d worn that dress, and a part of him appreciated the gesture - which was the opposite of the reaction she was trying to provoke.

“Angel Malcolm,” she said. “As my liege, accept my humblest wishes for a good first harvest to you, may Matka be pleased,” she said.

A dimple appeared in Malcolm’s cheek. He nodded to her, and then pulled Thomas aside, “May I speak with you a moment?” he asked, putting his hand on his son’s shoulder.

Thomas shrugged it off. “My apologies, father, but I can’t leave my guest alone. As you can see, she’s caused quite a stir, and everyone in the room will want an opportunity to speak to her. I can’t leave her alone, I’m afraid. Her attentions might wander away from me.”

Felicity stiffened. His arrogance and presumption rankled. Did he really think she wanted anything to do with any of these angels? She might be the daughter of an angel follower, but she was also Dally’s, and Dally had never hidden his contempt. She let her eyes roam about the large space, over the assembly. The angels stood in groups of three or four talking quietly, drinking wine or sipping okavita from long-stemmed goblets. There were no children present, and only a mound of dirt carefully piled in a decorative clay urn and placed on a corner of the dais gave any hint of the holy day they were celebrating. Felicity grabbed a goblet from the tray of refreshments behind her and held it tightly in her hands.

Malcolm gave Thomas a cold smile. “Another time then,” he said. He turned back to Hugo and Maximilian and asked, “Shall we petition them now?”

Tommy took Felicity’s elbow, but she only allowed herself to be moved a few feet away. Dally would want to know what Malcolm was up to, and if she didn’t plant herself here, she would not be able to tell him.

Maximilian put a hand to his beard and shook his head. “This is a party, Malcolm, not a council meeting, and there’s no immediate need to take action on Zemlya. Let’s wait until a more suitable time.”

“The entire Council of Angels is here, though,” Hugo said, “and it’s better to make decisions with everyone who is to be affected present.”

Malcolm nodded. “We’ve been putting this off long enough. Have you seen the state of Zemlya? There are homeless crowding the streets everywhere.” He turned to the crowd and said in a loud voice, “Would the members of the Council of Angels come forward? We would like to get bit of business out of the way before refreshments are served and the dancing begins.”

Eight angel men came from every corner of the courtyard and mounted the step to the dias. With the three clan heads, their number totaled eleven. Malcolm gestured for them to sort themselves out by clan, and when this was finished, said, “As you all know, Zemlya has not had a leader since Waldhar was elected archangel, and the situation in the quarter, especially with the siege and the resulting refugee problems, has become dire. We on the Council of Angels have discussed it and believe that, temporarily, Zemlya should be absorbed into one of the other clans so that it can be better managed.”

He gestured around the space. “Is there anyone here who has any reason why Zemlya should remain independent or any candidate to put forward to lead it?” Malcolm turned back to the dias, clearly intending to call for a decision from the council, when a deep masculine voice came from the back of the crowd.

“I do,” it said, and the assembly turned almost in one movement to see who was speaking. Felicity was on tiptoe before she even realized it, and she saw the glint of the sun’s final rays on white, white wings as an angel came forward, parting the crowd as he walked. He strode gracefully up to the dias, his wings absorbing the dying red light as he closed the distance. His face was angular, fierce, and beautiful, like Mount Lyeda itself. When he reached the foot of the dias, she felt a warmth go through her, and she tried to lower her gaze from him, but found she could not.

He halted before he could mount the step and looked at her, and that warmth in her hands and arms grew stronger. She glanced at the goblet and loosened her grip on it, but if anything the feeling spread further up her chest and into her face. The angel turned to her and stared, and she could see that his eyes were as blue as Lake Ladoga on a summer’s day, azure on indigo, a lighter circle within a darker one, the reverse of the lake: deep to shallow water. She felt as if she were drowning in them, and she blinked to clear her head and stop this ridiculous thought.

He looked down at the goblet in her hands and reached for it. “May I?” he asked, and she could only nod because, when his fingers brushed hers the warmth became heat and it spread through her entire body: a painless fever, a pleasurable burn. She almost dropped the glass, but he had it in his firm grip. He cocked his head at her, focusing his attention completely for a moment, and then he took the goblet, mounted the dais, walked over to the mound of earth in the pot and carefully poured the okavita into the shallow hole someone had dug into the middle of it.

“ _'Nasha dorogaya mama, daruy nam mir i khleb nasushchnyy na segodnya, vash prazdnik den',”*_ he said, bowing his head low. Then he set the goblet down on the dais and turned to the council.

“I am Oliver, my father was Robert, and I offer my leadership to Zemlya, my clan,” he said with a solemn smile, and the entire terrace burst into chatter at once as the jaws on every member of the Council of Angels dropped.

  
  
  
  
  
*Translation: “Our dear mother, grant us peace and sustenance for this day, your holy day.”


	6. Birthright

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Oliver claims his birthright, Felicity questions her parentage, and the two of them (finally) talk face to face.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay, here it is: _some real Olicity_ in this fic! I was dying to write this scene myself so I could squee over their first looks and touches. I hope you like it, and I hope it’s worth the wait.

It was a bit of a challenge gaining quiet entrance to a party held on a terrace in the open air for angels who all knew each other and had forever, but Oliver managed it. He waited until the sun slid down behind the mountain and then flew into a darkened crevice. He saw his old friend Tommy come gliding in carrying that woman - what was her name? - in his arms. She didn’t look too happy to be here, and he wondered at the red dress. All of the angels around him were dressed in the silk pastels of summer: pinks, grays, yellows, and she stood out like a smudge of blood on a clean tunic.

What was Tommy doing with her here? He watched as they approached Malcolm and she curtsied. He felt drawn to her in a strange way. A familiar warmth emerged in his chest, so he closed his eyes and focused on his gift. Yes, there it was, the sense that drew him to the better - it was pulling him toward her with some urgency. He was so focused on this surprising development that he only half heard Malcolm’s casual mention of the obliteration of his clan. He had been expecting something of this nature from him. His mother was rarely wrong. The absorption of Zemlya into another clan, however; that was a bold move. Very bold.

“I do,” he said before he realized he was speaking, and he drew himself from his darkened corner and walked into the light, sweeping his wings out behind him. Not fully extended, but raised behind him: a comrade in battle. Oliver knew the value of a good entrance. It was a skill you learned in Celestia on the playground. You learned it, or you went home bloody. Life in the capital was for survivors only.

The angels before him cleared out a path, and he walked down the center of it until he came to the dais. The woman - Felicity; yes, that was her name - stood there, her eyes wide, her golden hair a long shining line down her back, and he felt the warmth intensify until his fingertips were tingling with it. There was something about her, something important, that he was meant to notice, but he had no idea what that was. She was holding a goblet, and he had an idea. He took it from her hands, and touching her, he felt the heat all the way up his arms and into his chest. Her eyes widened. She felt it too. That was fascinating. He’d never…

He couldn’t get distracted by this, however, not when he had to both impress Malcolm and sideline his plans. The goblet of okavita was for good fortune and respect, and he needed both, even if the angels thought him a fool. He’d learned the rites during his time in the angel corps. Not all angels were as sanguine and confident as those in Zvyozda. Oliver bent over and poured the liquid into the urn and said the ceremonial words thanking Matka for her good gifts. When he stood up, he saw the shocked looks on the council faces and knew he’d succeeded in making an impression at least.

Malcolm recovered first. Oliver watched the cold smile crawl across his face. Then the young clan head of Veter stepped forward and said, “What do you think you’re doing? And _who_ are you?”

Maximilian gaze sharpened and he lifted a tangled gray eyebrow. “Oliver?” he said. “Robert’s boy? You’ve been gone so long we thought you had died.” Someone from the crowd tittered, and Oliver wondered what people had thought of his family and of Moira’s midnight exit all of those years ago.

“No, sir,” Oliver said finally. “My mother wouldn’t let me.”

Maximilian laughed. “I suppose Moira wouldn’t,” he said, stepping forward and clapping Oliver on the back. “Now what are you doing here - in Zvyozda and up here in front of us?”

Malcolm cleared his throat. “Yes, Oliver. We are, of course, well relieved you haven’t perished and happy to see you once again, but we’re in the middle of conducting important business, so if we could reschedule this reunion for a more convenient time…”

Oliver had to admire Malcolm’s focus and panache, but he didn’t have to allow himself to be sidelined. “But that’s why I’m here,” he said. “To help you solve the problem you’ve been debating. As a clan member whose family has served in leadership, I volunteer myself to Zemlya as leader.”

“But you _can’t_ ,” Veter’s clan leader said.

“Hugo,” Malcolm said, holding up a hand. “Let’s hear him out.”

“It is my understanding,” Oliver said, “that when a clan is absent a leader, any one of the ruling families from that clan can put forth the name of a member to lead. The other families have to offer an alternative within the clan or accept his leadership.”

Malcolm nodded slowly, his face a mask, but his eyes like his clan: fire.

“So that’s what I am doing,” Oliver said. “I’m putting my own name forth. Do any of the angel families from Zemlya object?” He raised his voice as he twisted to peer into the assembly. “Surely this would be a preferable solution to dissolving the clan.”

“Temporarily transferring leadership to another clan,” Malcolm said with a tight smile.

“I know I haven’t lived here for over a decade, so you can have no confidence in my abilities. However, if it would help, you could assign someone to monitor me in the beginning. If I make any large mistakes, he could report them to you. Someone you trust - your own son, perhaps?” Oliver turned. “Tommy?”

Tommy looked stunned. This was a bit of a gamble, and Oliver hoped that his relationship with his father was still as complicated as it had been. “Father,” Tommy said, his lips quirking. “You’ve been encouraging me to contribute more to angel leadership, and here is an opportunity. Do you approve?”

Malcolm straightened to his full height and gave a rough jerk of his head. “Unless there are any objections from the Zemlya families?” His voice raised as he looked into the crowd, but no one said anything.

“It’s decided, then,” Oliver said, smiling widely. “And may I say how pleased I am to be in Zvyozda again.” He grasped Malcolm by the hand and let his breath out slowly as the members of the Council of Angels surrounded him and began to ask questions.

  


>>\--->

  


The library was one of Felicity’s favorite places and had always been. The vast majority of the structure was built cunningly into Mount Lyeda, and the resources inside were arranged according to a secret system developed long before the Skalvians came to Karelia. When she was little, Dally had taught her each section by playing elaborate games of hide and seek. “I will hide where the animals are,” he’d say. She would think back to the place where all of the drawings were kept, the paintings of strange deer with very tall necks and snakes wrapped in colored ribbons, and how Dally had told her, “Turn right, and turn right again, and there they are: the animals are always right.”

Felicity now knew the place like the back of her hand, but there were still parts she would remember by this game. The walls in the foreign-tongues section were bumpy and sometimes moist - just like a tongue. She always touched them when she passed and bit down on her own tongue in memory.

There was a map to the whole library, and it was posted in the librarian’s room, but that map didn’t have any of the secret rooms or passages on it. Those were written down nowhere and never discussed, but she knew them all just the same. There was a room of magics, a room of very dark magics, and a room of Karelian history nobody ever learned. Dally had his own places too. He had been scratching out his knowledge of the West as long as she had known him: two copies of it. One for the record and one to back up the record in case anyone wanted to destroy it. Dally didn’t believe in taking chances with knowledge.

The front of the library was a stone structure with a large door and holes built into the roof line that allowed natural light to enter in the summer and smoke to exit in the winter. Scholars and leaders were welcome to use the library’s resources, to read them in the reading room, and to make copies. There were desks available for that purpose. Only the librarian - and now his apprentice, Anton - were allowed in the stacks, however. They received requests and granted access as they judged appropriate. They found the necessary book or scroll, brought it to the petitioner, and monitored its use.

The space beyond the reading room was built for the librarian. It was full of parchment, vellum, and ink. Books needing repair were tucked into small cupboards, and there was a shallow stone-lined pit in the floor where a fire could be lit to heat the room. Dally had crafted a small desk for Felicity to come and use. Only she was allowed past the front counter, past Dally’s solemn, forbidding face. She had her desk, her own chai cup too, and a soft blanket to use when the days were cold and the mountain offered little comfort.

She sat behind her desk now, wedged in with her knees pushing against the underside of it. Dally had built it for her long ago, and it was too small now, but neither of them wanted to replace it. She watched him as he opened the wooden partition between the librarian’s room and the outer room and narrowed his eyes at Anton. He didn’t think Anton was nearly responsible enough for this position, but the angels had overridden his opinion, and he was stuck with him.

“You should have been there, Dally,” she said. “When that angel from Zemlya walked up and volunteered to lead. Malcolm’s face was beyond what you’ve ever seen. He looked like one of your fish.” She opened her mouth and closed it, then opened it again. “He didn’t plan on that happening.”

“I’m sure he did not,” Dally said. “And while I didn’t want you there, it must have been something to see: Malcolm not getting his way. I’m sure it confused him. ‘What, I won’t be able to gobble up Zemlya today? How can this be?’”

Felicity laughed. “The angel wasn’t even frightened when Malcolm recovered and gave him that look. You know the one.”

Dally glared at her.

“No, no. That’s your librarian look. This was more like,” and she straightened and glowered at him, raising an eyebrow. “There’s a trick to it. It’s _angelic_.”

He mimicked her, and she laughed again at his silly, dear face trying its best to be aristocratic. “That’s the one. Oh, and I didn’t tell you… he did the rites for Matka. The new angel. Oliver. He recited the thanksgiving over the clump of dirt the angels put in a pot as, I don’t know, a nod to the day. Or maybe a joke.” She looked at Dally and shrugged her shoulders. “I know she’s not your goddess, but she’s still important to me.”

“She’s the earth mother, my owlet,” he said, reaching for two cups and the pitcher of chai she’d brought him for his lunch. “So, yes, she’s mine too, and I’m glad she did not go unremembered at the angels’ fancy party.”

Dally smiled at her fondly and then went solemn. “All levity aside, I need you to stay away from Malcolm. We may say things about him here in private, but he’s not a fool or a clown. He plans well into the future; I don’t want any of his plans to involve you.”

Felicity watched anger and tension chase away his smile and felt sad for it. “Why do you hate him so much?” she asked.

“An entire flock of sheep has been sacrificed to make the vellum so I could answer that question,” Dally said and poured chai into the cups. His hand shook a little.

“Stop, Dally; I’m serious. I’d like to know.”

“Well, perhaps only two sheep,” he said, offering her one of the cups.

“Is it because of Mama?”

“Your mother made her own decisions,” he said. “They may have been bold and reckless on occasion, but she lived with them and what they resulted in. She didn’t complain or blame anyone else.”

“Is it because of me, then?” She took the chai and drank it slowly, concentrating on the gingery taste and avoiding Dally’s face.

“No,” he said. “ _No._ He’s a ruthless leader and a terrible father. He brings out all of the worst qualities in his son. Thomas was actually very engaging as child.”

“I noticed that they were awkward and angry with each other at the party.” She hesitated a minute before asking what she was afraid to know. “Is Malcolm my father?” she asked, peeking up at him.

He reached out and touched her cheek. “Your mother never told me who sired you, Felicity, but, no, Malcolm isn’t your father. _I am_.”

“Oh, Dally,” Felicity said, pressing her hand against his. “Of course you are. You know what I mean, though.”

“I do, but do you really want to know?”

She didn’t know the answer, so she sipped her chai slowly until she could see the bottom of the clay cup. She sighed. It was time for her to do the work that everyone else believed was her reason for being here.

Felicity grabbed a broom and moved into the reading room. It didn’t need a great deal of tidying in the summer because the fires weren’t lit, but because of the invasion and Zvyozda’s overcrowding, they had more patrons than usual. Village priests came to study religious texts while they had the time and access, and healers did research on what the ancients believed caused illness and how it could be cured.

The Council of Angels appointed the castle librarian and provided modest support for maintaining resources, but there was a small charge for each patron to request materials, and Adalbert provided writing materials and research assistance for a price as well. Felicity checked the ink supply at the front counter and trimmed the nibs on the quill pens. She swept beneath the desks and spied a bird’s nest up in one of the open smoke holes.

Retrieving a ladder from Adalbert’s room, she climbed up the rungs to the top to dislodge it. As she was reaching out and had almost touched it, she felt a warmth spread through her hands. She had an uneasy feeling she knew the source of it. She looked down and saw the door opening, and the angel, Oliver, entered looking alert and intrigued. He raised his head in her direction, and their eyes locked.

For a moment she felt like she was falling. Was this witchery at work? The warm tingling only increased as she stared at him. His face in the dappled light of the reading room was the most beautiful thing she’d ever seen - open and strong and _amused_.

She jerked her head back up and shook it. Had she actually thought that? What was happening to her? Her sudden movement dislodged the ladder from where it had been propped, and before she realized what was occurring, she was _actually_ falling...until he grabbed the ladder and hefted it back up. The angel placed his hand firmly on the small of her back. Warm prickles flew up her spine and pierced her already addled brain. She gasped. It was all she could do to grab the rung of the ladder and try to hold on.

“There. That should be steady now,” he said. “Are you alright? You look a little pale.”

“Could you…” she started to say when Adalbert came out from the other room and raised an eyebrow. Oliver moved his hand away, and Felicity slumped her whole body weight against the rungs.

“Did she fall?” Adalbert asked.

“No, sir,” Oliver said. “I caught the ladder.”

“Well, good then,” Adalbert said. “Felicity?”

She closed her eyes. “I’m trying to get this bird’s nest from the smoke hole, Dally. Just give me a minute.”

“Did you need something?” Adalbert asked Oliver.

She knew he was moving away from the ladder because she felt that strange warmth ebb. “My apologies,” she heard him say. “I’m Oliver and the new head of Zemlya. I was told you were the man to see for information.”

Dally tilted his head. “Yes, I remember you - and your father, of course. Who told you that?”

“My friend, Barry. He said you know everything about Zvyozda and Karelia, and if I needed advice that you would be the one to ask.”

“Barry?” Dally asked. “Ah, Bartholomew. Yes, he comes here to research quite often and brings me cheese. He’s not a bad sort.”

Felicity opened her eyes again. Not a bad sort? She saw Oliver pat the pockets on his vest. “Yes,” he said. “He told me that. I brought--” He dug down into the right pocket and pulled out a pale round lump. “I have some cheese with me. It’s not a great deal. I’m sorry. But it’s from Celestia, and it’s very good. My mother loves it.”

Dally’s eyes widened. “Is that smoked?” He reached out his hand.

Oliver smiled. “Yes, it is. I prefer it that way.” He passed the cheese to Dally who took it with what Felicity thought was unseemly eagerness. Then he appeared to remember himself.

“What was it you needed help with?” he asked, straightening.

“To begin with,” Oliver said, “I need to see the records of Zemlya for the past thirty years.”

“The records?”

“Yes, births, deaths, legal matters, admittances, expulsions. You do keep those here?”

“We do,” Dally said. “In fact, I have them in my room at the moment.”

Felicity frowned. What was her father doing reading through Zemlya’s records? Oliver appeared to have a similar thought, but he didn’t comment. Instead he said, “And as for the rest, I have a number of problems to solve. The castle and Zemlya are different than I remember them being when I was a boy.”

Over the angel’s shoulder, Felicity saw Dally give him an assessing look. “Which problems are you thinking of?” he asked.

Oliver leaned his hip lightly against the counter. “There are at least four, as I see it. First, the refugees need to be housed and cared for. The streets need to be made safe again, and the food situation must be addressed. Zemlya will not survive the winter unless we can procure supplies. Finally, we need to train a force to defend the castle and expel the Skalvians.”

Felicity watched the bald spot on Dally’s head bob up and down as Oliver ticked them off. “An astute assessment,” he said when Oliver had finished.

“With all due respect, sir, it’s simple to see the problems,” Oliver said. “It’s far more difficult to solve them. Which is why I wanted to talk to you.”

He’s making allies, she realized. How many years had her father been waiting to have an angel ask for his opinion and help?

“It just so happens that I have given this a bit of thought,” Dally said. “Why don’t you come and have a cup of chai with me, and I’ll tell you what I think. I’m feeling generous today, and my daughter was impressed that you said the prayer to Matka at first harvest.”

Felicity felt her eyes open to their fullest extent. Had Dally just said that?  Had he said she was impressed with Oliver? Where was the god Perun when you needed a good lightning strike? Not here obviously.

Oliver turned and looked at her, those blue eyes twinkling at her from across the room. “Was she?” he asked. The prickles returned in her spine and her arms, and she clutched the ladder and held on.

“She was,” Dally said, opening the door to his room and waving his arm forward. “Matka is her favorite, you see.”

“We have that in common, then,” Oliver said, as he ducked his head under the door frame. “She’s my favorite too.”

  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  



	7. Zemlya's New Normal

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Oliver makes some changes, and not everyone is pleased.

Barry knocked on the door to Oliver’s house with some trepidation. His father had not wanted him to come back and help with Oliver’s mission. He knew that Zemlya was in terrible shape as a clan but wasn’t enthusiastic about sacrificing his only son in a hopeless struggle. Still, Barry was an adult now, if a very young one, and he made his own decisions. 

He was just about to knock again when the door opened and Oliver’s face appeared. “Come in,” he said and gestured with his arm. Barry walked in and saw that, in the small room to his right, Oliver already had company. A tall, dark-haired angel leaned against the fireplace mantle. It was Angel Malcolm’s son, Tommy.  

Tommy was years older than Barry, but there weren’t so many angels in Ogon that he didn’t know him. Everyone knew Tommy, both the good stories and the bad. 

“You know Tommy?” Oliver asked, echoing this thought.

“What?” Barry asked. “Oh, yes. Yes, we know each other.” He crossed his arms awkwardly in front of himself. “Not very well, of course, considering our ages and that he’s Angel Malcolm’s son, but…”

“Tommy’s going to be shadowing me,” Oliver said. “We were friends when we were kids, and I thought inviting him to do this might make his father more amenable to my being head of Zemlya.” He turned to Tommy. “I don’t want to come between you and your father--”

“Oh, please,” Tommy said. “Please come between us. It will be the best thing that’s happened to our relationship since I was born. Your being head of Zemlya is just the distraction he needs to stay out of my business.”

“Your business?” Barry asked, and then bit his upper lip. But Tommy didn’t appear offended.

“He’s taken it into his head that I need to marry because that’s obviously the most urgent problem facing Zvyozda at the moment - my lack of a wife.” 

Oliver raised an eyebrow. “Is that why you were with Felicity at the first harvest party? She didn’t seem exactly thrilled with your company.”

“She hates me,” Tommy said cheerfully. “I made her come.”

“You mean you asked her?” Barry asked.

“I didn’t ask her,” Tommy said. “I knew what she’d say given her step-father’s feelings for angels. My father is her clan head, though, so she had to do what I said.”

Barry just stared at him, and even Oliver had an astounded look on his face. “Is that how you usually handle women?” he asked. 

“Well, no,” Tommy said. “With other women, it’s about spending time together, enjoying each other’s company,” he raised an eyebrow, “but with Felicity, what I need is for my father to leave me alone. Besides, it’s not so hard for her to come to a few parties with me. Women love to chit chat and especially with angels.”

Oliver pivoted towards the window, and Barry caught an odd expression on his face before he turned away. He thought of Oliver’s mother holding court in her marble sitting room in Celestia. He couldn’t see Moira idly chatting with anyone, but he could imagine her reducing grown men to tears.

“And you chose Felicity because…” Oliver said.

“Because there is no one my father would want less to be his daughter-in-law. Her birth, her humanity, her step-father - Malcolm loathes Adalbert - will all send the message that he can’t force me to make a  _ good _ marriage at least.”

“So you’re rebelling against your father, and you’re dragging her into it?” Barry asked. 

“It’s not going to be for very long,” Tommy said, frowning. “In fact, I’m surprised we haven’t had the fight yet. This should have come up after the first harvest party.”

Barry found himself irritated with Tommy’s selfishness in a way he couldn’t explain. Perhaps it had to do with Tommy’s general success with women, but forcing someone to play a part so you could wriggle off the hook of your father’s expectations? That wasn’t right.

“Well, regardless,” Oliver said, “Tomorrow I make my speech to Zemlya, and I’d like you both to be there as reinforcements. If you’re willing.”

“Reinforcements?” Barry asked.

Oliver gave a tiny smile. “It’s possible that my plans will not be enthusiastically embraced by all,” he said. 

“You mean you’re going to make a crowd of people mad,” Tommy said. “Hey, remember the Avenging Host, and how we were going to right all the wrongs? What was our initiation line? ‘Do you swear to fight evil?’” He grinned.

Oliver smiled back. “And we’d sprinkle the Dust of Righteousness over our new member. I remember. But this is less about fighting evil, and more about cleaning house. And, yes, it’s going to upset both men and angels.” He shifted on his feet. “So I’d understand if either of you want to pass.”

“Wouldn’t miss it,” Tommy said. 

Barry felt much less confident, but he said, “I’ll be there.” Zemlya needed a real leader, and it desperately needed some housecleaning. “But I’m not sure how that will help.” 

“People like you,” Oliver said. “Even Adalbert likes you. It will make the pill easier to swallow    
for some Zemlyans.” 

“Adalbert likes me?” Barry asked. “I’ve always wondered. It’s the cheese, isn’t it? I know it’s the cheese.” 

Oliver smiled. “I think it might be the cheese,” he said. “It’s also the fact that you’re an earnest and responsible person, and that’s what I need for this.”

“For what exactly?”

“You’ll see tomorrow,” Oliver said. “If it gets ugly, you can always fly out of there. I won’t hold it against you.”

  
  


>>\--->

  
  


The hottest month grew older, and the air in Zvyozda grew heavy with moisture. The mornings and evenings were now the only bearable times to be outside, so Felicity made sure to get her gardening in early. The soil received the water so much better, and she could see how healthy each plant was before it became exhausted by the angry glare of Dazbog, the sun god, who was resentful he had to work so hard this time of year. One morning as she had just finished gathering coriander seed and cutting back the sage, Adalbert put a hand on her shoulder. She startled.

“You scared me, Dally,” she said, looking up at him. “What are you doing here so early?” She tucked the herbs into her basket with her gardening knife.

“I came to get you,” he said. “We have to hurry if we’re going to get all the way to Zemlya Square in time.” 

She stared at him. “What’s in Zemlya Square?” 

Adalbert just tugged at her shoulder until she stood up. “What’s in Zemlya Square, Dally?” 

“The angel Oliver is going to make his speech this morning,” he said. 

She felt her lower jaw drop. “And what has that to do with us?”

Dally rubbed his beard. “Well, I helped him compose it,” he said. “I’d like you to hear it - if you don’t mind me interrupting your chores.”

Felicity set her basket down on the ground and dusted off her hands. “I don’t mind,” she said, “But since when are you composing angels’ speeches?”

“Not all angels, just his,” Dally said. “You’ll understand when you hear it.” He gestured to her basket. “Leave that here in the shed, and come with me.” 

They passed through his grape arbor and out the garden gate into Ogon’s square which was still empty. There was no market today. It would be too hot. The cobbles under Felicity’s bare feet were already warm from Dazbog’s attention, and she was sweating a little under her thin woolen kirtle. 

Zvyozda’s walls grew out from Mt. Lyeda in a semi-circle, extending broadly across the valley’s basin. Nearest to the mountain face on either side were Zemlya and Voda. The River Yura flowed past Voda’s highest tower. In the middle were Veter and Ogon, so to reach Zemlya from Ogon, they had to pass through Veter. Felicity groaned at the thought.

Veter’s east gate was overseen by the angel Fulco who often liked to guard it himself. The authority he enjoyed wielding was a gift from Angel Hugo who had rewarded the angels he considered most valuable with titles or positions. Unfortunately for anyone who wanted to cross through Veter, Fulco was the kind of angel who, when given a tiny glimpse of power, ran into the birch forest to hunt it down. He was good friends with two of the angels all of the women in Zvyozda now avoided, in fact. Felicity avoided him whenever possible.

There was, of course, a wait at the gate. Each person who passed through now had to state his name and business. There were ways to bypass the requirement, but the man first in line would not be able to manage any of them in his current condition. He was barely on his feet, and Felicity could smell the ale on his clothes even far back in line.  

“Name and business,” Fulco said with a grin. “This should be interesting.” 

The man leaned forward and mumbled something.

“I’m sorry, I didn’t hear that. What was it you said?” Fulco asked. He crossed his legs, as the man gave it another hopeless attempt.

Dally, impatient, stepped out of line and said, “This man is drunk. He does not know what you’re saying. Is there any way we could facilitate this process so we might all be on our way?” Men and women in the line nodded and agreed.

“Ah, Adalbert,” Fulco said. “Our learned librarian. So good to see you. I’m sure you think that whatever errand you’re running is more important than our procedures here in Veter, but, unfortunately for you, this is not the library, and you do not make the rules.” He turned back to the man, “Let’s try this again: name and business,” he said. 

Dally took out a cloth from his pocket and rubbed his forehead with it. He turned to the man behind him. “How long does this usually take?” he asked.

“It could be hours,” the man said. “I was here last week and he grilled a pregnant woman until she nearly passed out.” 

“That’s outrageous,” Dally said. “We stand here just so he can be amused by his own pettiness.” He opened his mouth, but Felicity put a finger across it. 

“Don’t,” she said. “The more you say, the longer this will take. You know that.” 

Dally looked at the sky. “The speech,” he said. 

Felicity didn’t particularly want to the hear the speech or see Angel Oliver today, but she would do what she could for Dally who rarely asked for anything for himself. She stepped out of line and moved toward the gate. When she reached it, she took the drunk man’s arm and settled him on the ground. “Rest a little,” she said.

Fulco began to sputter. “I didn’t say he could sit down,” he said.

Felicity turned toward him and gave him her brightest smile. She shook her hair out over her shoulder and blinked up at him. “He looked like he might become ill,” she said. “And if that were to happen, it would stain the dignity of this gate. I thought it best to avoid that.”

Fulco looked mollified. “Yes, I...yes,” he said. “I suppose so.” He slid his gaze over her, up and down and up again. “Since you’re here now, I’ll ask you: name and business.” 

“I can’t tell you,” she said. “Yet.” She lifted her skirts up and adjusted them around herself. The air under them was becoming stifling in the rising heat.

“And why is that?” Fulco asked. His smile had softened. 

“It’s not my turn in line,” she said. “I can see that you want to honor the code of Veter, and I do not wish to hinder you. I will wait for these people to pass, and then I’ll tell you.” 

Fulco gave her an assessing look. She looked over the people in line and then lifted an eyebrow. “Well?”

“Name and business,” he said to the first woman in line. In a few minutes, everyone, even Dally, had passed through the gate, and the two of them were left with the drunk man. 

“Would you let this man through so he can pass out at home?” she asked. “I’m afraid he will be a nuisance to you all day if he stays here.”  

Fulco nodded. “Since you asked so nicely,” he said. She helped the man get up on his feet and through the gate. “And your name?” Fulco asked.

“It’s Felicity,” she said. “And I’m only passing through Veter, I’m afraid. But I will remember you and this.” 

Something in his eyes shifted, and for a second she saw past his pettiness and casual cruelty to the angel who wanted to be admired, but she didn’t want to see him that way, not now, not today, so she smiled again brightly and began walking through the square. Dally was waiting, and there was no time to be lost.

  
  


>>\--->

  
  


They barely made it to the Zemlya Square before the sun was at its height. It was crowded with people and angels by the time they arrived, and they were shunted off to the side, crushed into a run-down market stall, but she and Dally could still see Oliver standing on the steps of the a large ornate looking home, and they even had a little shade.

In the middle of the square, the people of Zemlya stood and waited, but the angels flanked Oliver on both sides, standing in clumps at the front and looking as curious as the people. Oliver cleared his throat and projected his voice. 

“Angels and people of Zemlya, I am Oliver, your new clan leader. My father was Robert. He was killed in the battle with the Skalvians fifteen years ago. I’m pleased to see so many here today who are concerned about the state of our castle and clan as we suffer this new attack. It has been many years since I’ve lived here, and I see a number of changes. Today I’m going to talk to you about how we will confront the problems of the siege and blockade together.

“We have four main problems: caring for our clan’s refugee members, reinstating safety and order, feeding ourselves this winter, and confronting the Skalvian menace. Would you agree?” Oliver paused in his speech to observe his audience. Many people were nodding, and to Felicity the crowd seemed receptive to his ideas.

“We do not have a great deal of time before these challenges become unmanageable, unfortunately. So we will act now. Beginning today, we will take our our brothers and sisters from the countryside - the ones who have lost their homes and farms to the Skalvians - into our homes. Any clan members who remain homeless after a week’s time will receive full rations of our stores this winter and will be fed first, before angels or men. My family’s house is empty - if dusty,” Oliver paused and smiled, “and I will find space there to house people. We all must do our part.”

Felicity heard a few exclamations and some grumbling behind her at this, but Oliver was still speaking, and people were inclined to listen.

“Second, we will begin readying our able bodied - both angels and men - to fight. I spent five years in the angel corps and can lead the training myself. It’s crucial that we be able to defend ourselves and our loved ones.”

This announcement electrified the audience, and the young men and women in the crowd began to talk animatedly to each other. Even the angels looked interested. 

“Third, all of our food is now communal property and will be cooked and distributed in common kitchens. Livestock will be cared for communally as well. If you own animals and wish to continue caring for them, please make your request to the clan council we will be forming. Be assured that after we survive this, your animals will be returned to you, if possible.”

The woman in front of Dally pulled on her husband’s sleeve. “I don’t see how we can keep our chickens a secret, but we need to hide our grain,” she said. “If we don’t, the angels will take it and eat it all.”

Felicity turned to Dally. “Is everything Oliver is saying truly necessary?”

“We should have done that from the first day we heard the Skalvians were marching on us,” he said with an unusual intensity, “but the people here are unfamiliar with starvation and what it does to you.”

“All of the angels’ stores,” Oliver said, “will be added to the common stores, of course.” 

The angels in the front began to object, but Felicity was too far away to hear their individual voices. Several of the younger male angels began to muscle their way towards the steps.

“And finally,” Oliver said in a loud firm voice, “we will enforce safety. The curfew will be extended to all, including angels, and will be in force from dark to dawn. No one will roam the streets of Zemlya at night. We will have both angel and human patrols to ensure this. All of our violent crimes will be judged in Zemlya by a combined angel/human court and not be passed on to the high angel court.  _ Anyone _ convicted of a violent crime will be expelled beyond the walls for the Skalvians to deal with.” He finished his speech and stood straight, his shoulders out, ready to face the crowd’s reaction. It came almost immediately.

The angels who had been pushing forward rushed the steps, four or five of them all at once. Felicity didn’t have time to count them, she could only grasp Dally by the arm and press her knuckles to her mouth. 

“He expected this, Felicity,” Dally said in a comforting voice, but she could feel the tension in his body as they both watched Oliver be overtaken. 

The angels closed in with their fists in front of them, surrounding Oliver in a rough circle, but just as he was about to disappear, his white wings extended and he leapt into the air. In one fluid movement, he kicked the first angel in the throat then pivoted and pushed off the stone wall behind him to drive his legs into the chest of another. He swung around smashing the third angel in the face and, while he still had the element of surprise, he elbowed the fourth in the groin. The crowd moved forward to watch, its chattering dying down. Felicity was pushed behind a tall woman and could no longer see what was happening. When she managed to right herself and peer forward again, she saw that the steps had five prone bodies littering them.  Oliver brushed himself off and began undoing the ties on his silk tunic with one hand.  

To his left, Angel Thomas looked shocked, but the tall, thin angel on his right was attempting to hide a smile. Oliver spoke up again, his voice loud and firm. “As I said, I spent five years in the angel corps, and I helped to quell nearly every kind of violence there is. The rules I have just instituted are for your protection, not for my benefit. I doubt if anyone here has seen the remains of a village that has starved to death or what a castle looks like after a massacre. I have. What’s more, I have seen these Skalvians up close when we fought them years ago. They took us hostage, they killed my father, and they left me with this.” He pulled his tunic over his head and turned his back to the crowd.  He held his wings in the middle of his back, fully extended so what was there was visible. 

Even from this distance, Felicity could see the myriad scars that covered his muscled arms and back, but one mark stood out among the rest. On his left shoulder a dragon breathing ice, the Skalvian mark, had been branded. The skin was red and puckered around the damaged flesh. It looked oddly fresh.

“No one hates the Skalvians more than I do,” Oliver shouted above the gasps of the crowd. “But we have to survive to fight them. Zemlya lives or dies together, as a clan. It’s time we began acting like one again.” 

He swept his hand out towards the bodies at his feet. “We will call this a family squabble, but any future violence will be dealt with as I have described. Now, I’d like to meet with all of the clan council members in my house so we can begin delegating responsibilities and prepare for what is coming. You may direct any of your questions in the next days to them.” He gave the crowd a nod and then opened the door behind him and went inside. 

  
  


>>\--->

  
  


“Can he do that?” Felicity asked Dally as they pushed their way through the square and back toward Veter. The people around them were talking loudly, some of them clearly angry and others very excited. Several important looking men mounted the steps where Oliver had been and disappeared behind the door, but no one else approached it. A couple of angels came, helped their wounded friends up, and hauled them off.

Adalbert stopped and looked at her, his lips pulling into what looked like a-- 

“Are you smiling, Dally?” she asked.

He shifted on his feet and crossed his arms. “You don’t know how long I’ve waited to see this, Felicity,” he said.

“To see what?”

“To see an angel actually care what happens to the people of Zvyozda. I knew what he was going to say up there -- we discussed it at some length -- but it’s different to actually watch your ideas being put into place.”

“And you  _ agree _ with it?” she asked. “You  _ hate it _ when angels tell people what to do. How can you be alright with this?”

“Because he’s right, Felicity, and because I need you to survive this. There’s a very real chance of  _ you dying _ if we don’t do something about this now.” 

She raised her eyebrows at him. 

“You were a small child when the Skalvians came the last time, and you don’t remember what they did. Even if you did remember, you wouldn’t understand what’s at stake here. The Skalvians have murdered entire cities before. They’ve called down plagues. They burn their enemies alive. They rape women en masse.” He put an arm around her shoulder. “Owlet, I’m  _ not going to let that happen to you _ . If that means I have to partner with an angel, I will do it and gladly.

“But,” he said, “there is a blessing in all of this that has not escaped me.” 

“A blessing?”  

“Watch and see,” he said. “What Oliver has done today will have reverberations on all the other clans. That’s going to be satisfying to watch. Voda will fall in line because that house has always aligned itself with Zemlya and Maximilian wants his people to survive. Veter and Ogon will hold out, but their people will see what’s happening here and begin to demand more safety and security for themselves. Malcolm will not be able to claim any of this as his idea, and he will have pulled out all of his hair by final harvest trying to retain control of Zvyozda. I can’t wait to see Malcolm bald.” Dally let out a laugh and rubbed his own bare head.

“Did you  _ plan _ this?” Felicity asked.

Dally looked surprised. “No. No, I couldn’t have pulled this off. This is Oliver’s strategy. I only advised him on a few matters.”

“A few,” Felicity said. 

“Perhaps more than a few,” Dally said. “He saw the need on his own, though - you know that. What he did up there on those steps... and the reasons Zemlyans will follow him? That’s because he’s a natural leader. I could never do that.” 

“So you think we should do as he says?”

“I think we’d be the greatest of fools not to,” Dally said. 


	8. Secrets in the Library

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Oliver and Felicity stumble across each other's secrets...and one more.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is my favorite chapter of this fic, with the possible exception of chapter 10 - for completely different reasons. Here we have significant interaction, and I like to think it's romantic. It is to me, at least. Maybe that's the author's conceit. 
> 
> This is my ancient Slavic version of soulmates right here. 
> 
> And then there's the thing with Dally. 
> 
> I’m posting this Saturday night instead of Sunday because I cannot. Wait. Any. More. Enjoy.

Three days after his speech in Zemlya’s square, refugees began moving into Oliver’s family home. It took that long to sort everything out with the clan councilmen, largely because this particular problem involved direct domestic arrangements and the women of the clan wanted to have a say about just who would be living within their families. The council meetings became so heated that Oliver took a two-pronged approach to settling things: he threatened, and Barry cajoled. Combining their efforts, they managed to get all of the refugees off the streets by the fourth day.  

When his five families began taking residence, Oliver knew they’d have to be advised of the same protocol he’d told the clan councilmen - all refugees were to bathe and be checked for lice before they could settle into any house in Zemlya. It had only been a few weeks since these people had streamed into the castle looking for somewhere safe to stay, but many of them had been sleeping huddled in alleyways or stables with very limited access to any water or soap. Oliver had seen too many soldiers sicken and die of war fever to take any chances now. The best way to handle a plague was to prevent it. 

This was a tricky rule to implement, however. Some of the refugees were older, well respected in their villages, and they already felt humbled and humiliated without anyone pointing out their bedraggled appearances and filth. As he surveyed his group, he saw an older couple helping arrange what baggage the people had brought with him. The woman stopped sorting to help a young mother with a crying baby. She pulled something from her apron and popped it into the child’s mouth, and the wailing stopped then and there. Then she moved on to assist a very old woman who was trying to walk and drag a big bundle. She called to her husband to help, and he dragged over a couple of boys who looked like they had energy to burn.

Oliver walked over to the woman and said, “Pardon me, Grandmother.”

She laid the bundle back on the ground and glanced up at him. Her hand went to her throat. “You’re...him,” she said.

“I am Oliver, the new clan leader of Zemlya,” he said. “May I have your name?” 

“I am Mila,” she said and grabbed the arm of the man beside her, “and this is my husband, Yaroslav. We are from the village Baranov. Thank you for taking us in.”

“Yes, thank you,” Yaroslav said. “My wife’s mother has pain in her joints, and she needs to lie down somewhere dry and soft.”

“You’re most welcome,” Oliver said. “I would like to ask you something, Yaroslav.”

“Anything,” Yaroslav said.

“Is you wife a good cook?” 

Yaroslav smiled. “She is, angel. She can make a small feast even in late winter when the cellar is empty, and she’ll put it before you like it’s a gift.” 

Oliver put a hand on his shoulder. “I need someone to take care of this house. I have a number of responsibilities to take care of, but my mother would never forgive me if I let something happen to her home.” This was true, but only a problem if Moira returned to Zvyozda. He viewed that as unlikely. “Do you think your wife would be interested in running it for me? I could also use your help. The place hasn’t been lived in for so long and needs some repairs. I would appreciate your experience.” 

The man looked pleased. “Mila is never happier than when she is managing people and things, Angel Oliver,” he said. “We would like to help where we can.”

“Excellent,” Oliver said. “Let me show the pair of you around. There is a private bathhouse on the grounds. I’ve emphasized this with all the other householders who are sheltering people, but we need to make sure everyone is clean before they enter the house. It may sound odd, but I’ve seen war fever race through a population before. I don’t know what causes it, but it comes when there are many people living together in a small space without access to water for bathing.”

The woman, Mila, nodded her head. “I’ve seen it too, when I was a child, in the city I was born in.”

“Then you know how fast it comes and how many people it can take,” Oliver said. “Give these people a chance to bathe thoroughly before they settle in, and enlist some of them to help you clean the house. All of it. No doubt it’s got vermin we need to rid it of. We need to make sure there are no lice, no flies, and no rats.”  

“How do you want the people settled in your house?” Yaroslav asked. 

“There are a number of rooms,” Oliver said. “Make sure they are comfortable. The room on the top floor is mine. The rest you can distribute as you see best and according to these people’s needs. Let these people know they can use the common rooms as well, but give them something to do. We need to be an example to the rest of the clan of how we can live well together.” He leaned in towards Mila. “If I cannot keep peace in my own house, the other clans will not take us seriously, and you know better than they how much we need to succeed since you’ve already lost your homes.”

Yaroslav straightened. “You are right, angel. We will not betray the trust you are giving us. Right, Mila?”

Mila smiled up at Oliver as a tear ran down her face. “Thank you, angel,” was all she said. 

  
  
  


>>\--->  

  
  


Three days later Oliver made his way to the library again. It wasn’t that things weren’t going smoothly. They weren’t, of course; that was to be expected. Hammering out who would serve in local leadership was contentious. The head of his clan council, Lech, had difficulty letting things pass out of his own hands, and women were demanding to serve on the court so they could adjudicate over rape accusations. He had to patrol every night too because the angels didn’t like being subjected to the curfew. 

Slowly, though, things were shaping up. The streets were clear of refugees and teams of people were working on cleaning up the refuse of months or years of neglect. The communal kitchen on his street was being set up under Mila’s watchful eye. Many young people had volunteered to defend the castle, and Oliver had separated them into training groups according to size and ability. Most surprisingly, Maximilian had come to him and asked how Voda could be included in his plans, and now they were working on coordinating their training and weapons forging.

He should have been satisfied with the progress Zemlya had made so far, but he wasn’t. Despite what he’d told the crowd of Zemlyans about their enemy, he felt unprepared to fight. Oliver had faced any number of enemies in his time in the military, but the Skalvians were different. The refugees that continued to stream into the castle told stories of their immense strength and incredible cruelty: they razed cities they could have collected tribute from, they burned crops their soldiers might have eaten. 

He’d seen them up close and knew they looked like ghosts with their tall, narrow bodies and their long white hair. They were taller than humans and at least three times as strong. The force with which they’d been pillaging Karelia was reportedly small, and yet he didn’t dare face them until the clans had active and trained soldiers - and perhaps something else up their collective sleeve.

It was for that reason he went back to see Adalbert. The girl and the strange sensations his gift produced around her had nothing to do with it.

The doors to the library were open, presumably to let in the light, but when he went inside it was empty. He glanced up at the smoke hole and saw the bird’s nest still stuck there, so, on impulse, he flew up and grabbed it. Gliding down, he held it gently before him until he could place it on the counter. It was made of soft fibrous strands cunningly wound together, and inside it were the remnants of a tiny pink egg. 

Near to the door he felt the warmth start in his fingers, and, out of curiosity, he moved silently to the wooden partition that separated the reading room from Adalbert’s. She was there; he knew it. He slowly slid the wood until it was open two fingers’ width. He saw her hair first and the book next.

She was curled up on a chair behind her small desk, her thick braid falling over her shoulder, and down between her breasts. On top of the desk was an archaic book with a loose binding. It was filled with tiny pictures he recognized as runes. Felicity was sliding her finger over the vellum very carefully, and her lips were moving silently.

She could read. She could read  _ runes _ . His fingertips flashed and prickled, and he backed himself up against the wall next to the partition, so she would not look up and see him. Surely she’d know he was here, though. He’d seen her eyes widen when their fingers touched, when he’d placed his hand on her spine. That had never happened before. Usually his gift operated one way, giving him information that he could use to make a decision or move forward. It had never acted to give anyone else information about him. 

Oliver took his prickling index finger, moved it underneath the partition and, bit by bit, slid it closed. He waited several moments then before he moved back to the counter and coughed loudly. He was entirely aware of her on the other side of that thin piece of wood, and the little gasp of air he heard her take was unconsciously arousing. The pages of her book rustled and its dusty cover gave a little plop as it landed on the thick vellum. 

He heard her bare feet hit the stone floor and then pad their way towards him. The door to the librarian’s room opened, and there she was: small, vaguely untidy, and unbearably lovely. Her lips formed an “O” when she saw him, and then dimples appeared in her cheeks as she pursed her lips. She turned back to the room and called, “Dally? Can you come? Angel Oliver is here to see you.”

Oliver scooped up the bird’s nest from the counter. “How do you know I’m not here to see  _ you _ ?” he asked. “See? I’ve brought you a gift.” He placed the nest in her hand, and she looked down into the small hollow and saw the eggshell. 

“Oh,” she said, eyes widening. “It’s pretty. Is that--”

“The one that was in the smoke hole, yes,” he said. “You left it there.” 

“I must have,” she said, looking up again. Impulsively, Oliver cradled her hands with his, and there it was, the warmth, it wriggled its way up his fingers and arms and into his neck. He shivered in reaction, and he felt the same response go through her.

“You feel it too, don’t you?” he asked. 

“Feel what?” she asked but then shivered again. Oliver experimented by reaching down into his abdomen to where he’d always visualized his gift residing, and he kicked it with his mind. Just a little kick, to show the pushy little thing who was in charge. Warmth exploded through his whole body until he felt embarrassingly aroused. He closed his eyes and took a step back, bumping into the counter. He breathed in and out slowly.

When he felt he had himself under a bit of control, he opened his eyes again and looked at her. Her pupils were so large her eyes looked black and the nest was shaking in her hands. “That,” he said. 

The door opened and Adalbert came bustling out, wiping his head with a cloth. “You called?” he asked Felicity and then noticed Oliver. “Oh, hello,” he said. “How are things in Zemlya progressing?”

“Slowly, but well,” Oliver said. “Maximilian asked me if Voda’s men could train with ours. I thought that was a good sign.” He didn’t miss the mildly smug look Adalbert gave Felicity or her raised eyebrows. The old librarian had apparently predicted this - which meant Oliver’s own instincts were still functional. That was good to know.

“So I, uh, was wondering, sir, if you had any information on the Skalvians here in the library. Any histories, travel accounts, even literature. Anything that could help us understand how we might defeat them.” 

Adalbert’s face brightened and then almost immediately went slack. “I’m afraid we have nothing on the Skalvians or Skalvia,” he said.

Felicity’s head swiveled. “What?” she asked. “Dally--” Then she glanced at Oliver and pressed her lips together. Oliver focused his attention on Dally who looked suddenly confused and mildly panicked. 

“Your father,” Oliver said to Felicity, and she glared at him and then took Adalbert’s arm and led him to his chair. “Are you feeling alright, Dally?” she said. She pulled a blanket from a wooden shelf and wrapped it around him. “You seem confused. Are you tired?”

“I don’t feel tired,” Adalbert said. His voice wasn’t weak, but it was duller than usual? Oliver hadn’t talked to him that many times, but even though he was older, he’d never seemed senile before. Did he lapse into forgetfulness at times? He didn’t have long to debate this, however, as Felicity opened the door and all but pushed him out into the reading room and to the spot where the counter met the wall. 

“What is going on here?” Felicity asked in an accusing tone?

“You’re asking  _ me _ ? He’s your father. Does he fade out like that regularly?” 

“Never,” Felicity said. “Dally knows the library’s contents like his own name. He never forgets anything. Ever.”

“So there  _ are _ Skalvian books here?” Oliver asked. Again she gave him that pursed mouth look, but this time it was followed by an appraising one. 

She reached out and grabbed his right hand and pressed it against her own. He felt the sparks go off and he saw her reaction in her round blue eyes. She definitely felt it too; there was no doubt. “What is this?” she asked.

“This?” he said.

“Don’t underestimate me,” she said. “You want to know about the Skalvians?” The prickles that came along with her words made him want to pull his hand from hers. “Then I need to know what  _ this _ is.”

He bent his knuckles over her fingertips and then placed her hand on the counter. “It’s my gift,” he said.

“Your gift.”

“I have this ability to sense direction,” he said carefully. “It’s not like east or west; it’s more like good or bad, but specifically how it relates to me and what I should do. I’ve always been able to focus on that sense, and it would ‘tell’ me what to do.”

Wrinkles appeared between her eyes. “Does it feel...warm to you? And tingly?”

He nodded. “The warmer it feels, the more important.” He shifted on his feet. “I’ve never had anyone else feel it, though. Before now.” 

Her eyes widened. “So this isn’t... _ usual _ for you?” 

“It’s very unusual,” he said, “and, to be honest, I don’t know exactly what it means, except that I think you’re important somehow to what I’m doing here in Zvyozda.”

“What are you doing here in Zvyozda?” she asked. “What exactly?”

“You know why I’m here,” he said. “I want to help Zemlya and the entire castle fight off the Skalvians.”

“And?” She put her other hand on her hip. 

He paused. This wasn’t in his plan. Felicity disliked angels, she made no attempt to hide it, and she wasn’t even in his clan. But if his gift thought he needed her, he had to give her a sign of good faith. “And I want to know what happened to my father and who betrayed us.”

“And that’s everything? The entire reason?”

He nodded. “That’s it. That’s why I came back.” He watched her sigh and then leaned slowly into her space. He picked up her hand again. “So,” he said, threading his fingers through hers, “what do you know about the Skalvians?”

  
  


>>\--->

  
  


She should have been prepared for the blast of heat and stinging that accompanied his question, but Felicity wasn’t. She wasn’t sure anything could have prepared her for the intensity of his expression or the nearness of his body. This close she could see the individual whiskers of his light beard. She could count the lines in his lips as they stretched to hiss the word “Skalvians.” His white teeth flashed briefly, and she leaned back away from him so she could catch her breath. 

“Well, Dally’s the librarian,” she said at last. 

He tilted his head at her. “And he doesn’t think the library has any books or scrolls on Skalvia.”

“Mmhmm,” she said. “But…”

“But there are,” he said slowly, “And you know about them because you’ve  _ seen _ them?”

This was dangerous territory. Her whole life Dally had told her never to tell a living soul about what she knew about the library, and she hadn’t. No one in Zvyozda had any idea. She looked down at the floor.

“Oh, no,” he said. “There’s more, and you’re going to tell me. It’s only fair.” She lifted her head up again and glared at him, but he tightened his hold on her hand. “You know,” he said slowly, looking into her eyes, “because you’ve  _ read _ them.” And the traitorous tingling returned with force. She tugged her hand, but he did not let go. 

She nodded weakly. “Only some of them. Dally taught me to read it years ago after I learned Latin and the Frankish tongue. I brought him a book I found in the stacks, and he went over the vocabulary with me and the script. He learned it long ago. In Celestia, I think.” 

Oliver’s eyes widened, and she didn’t know if it was because she’d told him she could read or because of Dally’s confusing behavior. “But Adalbert denied that the library had any books.” 

“It doesn’t make any sense,” she said. “He’s seen them. He’s read them. He knows I know about them. So why is he lying? He doesn’t lie.”

“I don’t think he’s lying,” Oliver said. “You said he’s not senile?”

“Not at all,” Felicity said. “He has a mind like a steel trap. That’s why they had to make him librarian - because no one else can read and understand the collection.” 

“Except you,” he said.

“No, he’s much better than I am,” she said. 

“Let’s try something, then,” he said. “Do you know where the Skalvian texts are?”

She nodded. 

“Go and bring a few of them back, and we’ll note his reactions.” He dropped her hand and gestured to the door which she opened. Dally was still sitting in his chair wrapped in his blanket, and while he was still distracted, she grabbed a candle and slipped through the back door into the stacks. 

The library was arranged counterintuitively in order to maintain secrecy. Felicity thought this likely had less to do with true Zvyozdan conspiracies and more to do with some long ago librarian’s paranoia, but she’d mastered the system before she could bleed, and so she moved through the book shelves of the larger chamber easily. The room was cut out of the rock, but cleverly hewn skylights dispelled some of the darkness. The books in foreign tongues were in one of the smaller rooms and down a level. She descended the steps carefully, holding her candle aloft.

In a couple of minutes she was where she needed to be, in a much darker section. She trailed a fingertip over the bumpy walls out of habit and then squinted as she moved that same finger across the aged leather of the books’ bindings. Ah, yes, here they were, the small collection of books on travelers’ tales and some literature in Skalvian. She slipped two of them and a box holding a scroll off the shelf and cradled them under her arm. She wished she’d remembered to bring her basket with her. They were heavy and awkwardly shaped. As she left the room, she rebalanced them and gripped her candle holder tighter.

Ten minutes later she was pushing open the door to the librarian’s room, and she paused when she saw Oliver push a cup of tea into Dally’s hands. “I’ve got them,” she said, and they both turned to look at her.

“Got what?” Dally asked, frowning.

“These,” she said, placing them on the table before her father. Can you tell me what they say, Dally?” 

Dally’s frown deepened as he put his cup aside and opened the first book. “Where did you get these books?” he asked.

“In the stacks,” she said, “with the other languages.” 

“But we don’t have any Skalvian books,” he said. 

“We do,” she said and flipped open the top one. “See, this one is yours, even. It has your name on the inside, and these notes in the back are in your handwriting.”

Dally leaned over and read the first page. “Oh,” he said. “This is a good one. I always thought it was engrossing. It’s about Skalvian religious rites. There is a whole section about a deep pool in the middle of their mountain, and how the waters are alive. It’s fascinating, really, how a culture’s narrative reveals its people’s own dreams and wishes.” 

Felicity looked at Oliver. She picked up the second book. It had an extensive vocabulary listed inside, again in Dally’s handwriting. “And this one?”

“Oh, I wrote those while I was enslaved in Celestia,” Dally said. “The library there had a great deal more resources than ours in Zvyozda does, but one makes do with what one has.” 

Oliver reached over. “Excuse me, sir,” he said, as he scooped up all three of the items from the desk and left the room. Through the open door, Felicity saw him stow them underneath the counter in a deep drawer. Then he came back.

“Adalbert,” he asked as he closed the door, “I was wondering if the library here had any texts in Skalvian?”

Dally’s face immediately went cloudy. “I’m afraid we have nothing on the Skalvians or Skalvia,” he said, “although we do have many Latin texts and some in the tongue of the Franks.”

And with that, Felicity heart sank. She looked at Oliver. “He’s been bespelled,” he said simply, and she knew it was true.


	9. Searching for Answers

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Oliver has a chat with Adalbert, and Tommy and Felicity find a solution to their problem in an unlikely source.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I renamed most of the herbs in this chapter as medieval monks referred to them. That was pretty fun.

Two days later Felicity stood in front of the door to her house and watched as two angels entirely blocked out Dazbog’s light in their descent. Thomas and Oliver touched down and straightened their wings, and she ushered them quickly into her front parlor.

“You made the list?” Oliver asked.

“Yes,” she said, “I memorized it. We have three of the easier to find ingredients here in our house, but I’m going to need to get two from one of the herbalists I know, and the third is likely to be found only with Sobena.”

“The witch?” Thomas asked.

“I don’t know if she’s truly a witch, but some people call her that,” Felicity said.

“What do we need, and why am _I_ doing this?” Thomas asked.

Felicity opened her mouth, but Oliver was already speaking. “Because the shopkeepers and Sobena will help you because you’re Malcolm’s son.”

“But you’re the clan leader of Zemlya, and she’s lived here in Zvyozda all of her life,” Thomas said.

“I’m not an angel,” Felicity said, sighing. “So the rules are different. Sobena’s in Veter. She doesn’t have to do anything for me.”

“All of these people know both Malcolm and you better than they do me,” Oliver said.

Thomas nodded. “I suppose this will give us another chance to display our love,” he said, batting his eyelashes once at Felicity.

She pressed her lips together. “So this is what we need. I already have mayweed flowers, blackwort, and birch bark. We need to find agrimony, elf leaf oil, and angelica root.”

“Elf leaf oil? This is for what exactly?” Thomas asked.

“It’s better if you don’t know,” Oliver said.

Thomas looked at him a moment and then said, “Alright, I understand: I’m the escort. Don’t ask questions. But I do need to know where we are going.”

“We’ll go to the herbalist, Brana, here in Ogon first,” Felicity said. “Perhaps she’ll have everything, and we won’t need to see anyone else. If not, I’ll need you to take me to see Sobena in Veter.” 

“And what are you going to do, Oliver?” Thomas asked.

“I have a few questions for Adalbert,” Oliver said. “I may not be here when you return.”

Felicity nodded at both of them and said, “Let’s go see Brana, then.” Thomas held out his arm, she took it reluctantly, and Oliver opened the door to her house.

 

>>\--->

 

Oliver made his way through the front hall and to Adalbert’s small sitting room. The librarian was there, paging through some bound records, and he looked up at the sound of Oliver’s footsteps.

“Ah, Oliver,” he said, “Thank you for coming. I wanted to discuss a few things with you. Please sit down.” He indicated a stool in the corner. “Our furniture isn’t designed for angels. I’m sorry.”

Oliver picked up the stool and brought it with him over to the table. “Felicity went to find the ingredients we need,” he said. “I had Tommy accompany her. I know you don’t like him, but he can get things she can’t. She’ll be safer in Zvyozda as it is now if she has an escort.”

Adalbert nodded. “I wish the other spells we tried would have worked. Whatever was cast on me must be complicated and specific. Even thinking about it makes me confused.”

“You forget a specific type of information about the Skalvians,” Oliver said.  

“I can’t imagine what I’m forgetting,” Adalbert said. “I know that the Skalvians are a terror of an army and commit atrocities wherever they go.”

“You remember that because the angel patrols came back and told the council what they saw. Perhaps you knew it before or heard stories. You can remember these kinds of details about the Skalvians, just not what is in the books in the library.”

“We don’t have books on the Skalvians in the library,” Adalbert said, and, despite himself, Oliver couldn’t help smiling.

“I know, sir. You’ve told me. But there are books on spells and reversal spells.”

“Oh, a whole section of them,” Adalbert said. “Our collection on magic and herbalism is the finest in all of the eastern part of the empire. We regularly receive visitors who come only to study them.”

“We tried several of the lesser reversal spells on you,” Oliver said. “You remember that, right?”

Adalbert pressed his lips into a thin line. “I’m not stupid. Or senile. Of course, I remember. The candles, the water, the black bowl. Felicity burned a bunch of sage and waved it in my face. It was all very mystical and didn’t change anything in the slightest except for giving me a headache.”

“Which is why she’s now gathering supplies for a stronger reversal spell: agrimony, angelica root, mayweed, birch bark, blackwort, and elf leaf oil.”

“If anything will work, that should,” Adalbert said. “I don’t want her mixing herself up in any of the darker magics. I may not be the most devout man, but I don’t believe in doing blood spells or trying to manipulate the gods. They’re unpredictable enough as it is.”

Oliver reached his hand out and touched the book of records on the table. “You’ve gone through all of these?” he asked.

“I have,” Adalbert said.

“And?”

“And there are no expulsions from the past thirty years. Zemlya hasn’t expelled anyone. There are the usual transfers of clan affiliation upon marriage or request, but, according to these, Donna was wrong. Her clan never denied her or cast her out.”

“Which means she remained a member of Zemlya until her marriage,” Oliver said. “And her daughter was born into my clan.”

Adalbert smiled. “She was. And since I never formally adopted her or requested her transfer into Ogon after I was placed by the Council of Angels under Malcolm’s leadership, she’s still a Zemlyan.”

“And you want her to remain a Zemlyan.” Oliver said.

“I want to make sure Malcolm has no right to her and no authority over her. I raised her to be wary of angels, but she should be doubly wary of him, and I’m not sure she is.”

“Is he interested in her?”

“He never has been, but Malcolm has a sixth sense. It’s uncanny how good a shakhmati player he can be - using real people and angels as his pawns. We’re under attack, all of Karelia is facing enormous challenges to its survival. I want to be sure she’s safe from Malcolm if anything happens to me.”

Oliver could read the subtext of this conversation; it wasn’t difficult. But he still felt awkward voicing it. “And you want me to make sure of that, don’t you, sir?”

“I do,” Adalbert said. “That’s the whole reason I’m working with you: to keep her safe from all harm. You’ll do that, if it comes to it?” His eyes held Oliver’s. “She’s the only thing that matters to me.”

Oliver nodded slowly. “I will,” he said.

 

>>\--->

 

As Felicity expected, they were only partially successful in their mission within Ogon’s quarter. Brana’s shop was still open, but she only had the agrimony. She did not want to sell it because she wasn’t sure when she would be able to get more, but Thomas smiled at her and touched her hand, and Felicity watched her be persuaded with a conflicted annoyance.

She and Thomas walked across the quarter to see if another man Felicity had occasionally bought supplies from might have the angelica root or the elf leaf oil, but his shop was closed.

“I suppose we’ll have to go to Veter now,” Felicity said, propping her basket against her hip. “We’d better hurry. It will be a long wait at the gate.”

Thomas looked at her. “At the gate? You’re not thinking of walking there? Isn’t that why you brought me along - to facilitate this process?”

“So you’re suggesting we…”

“We fly,” Thomas said. “Of course we fly.”

“Oh, no,” Felicity said. “We did that before, and I didn’t like it. You just grabbed me, and then we were so high above the castle, all I could do was hold on until it was over.”

Thomas gave her a slow grin. “You’re complaining about my flying technique? Because I could slow down and make it better for you.”

Felicity’s eyes widened. “Are you...are you teasing me?”

Thomas’s face lightened. “Yes,” he said. “Why not?”

“Why _not_? Because you’ve forced me into being your pretend woman in front of your father and everyone? So you can wiggle out of your responsibilities to your family?”

“You’re not pretending to be a woman,” Thomas said. “You’re definitely that.”

When she gave him a hard look, he sighed and said, “It really has nothing to do with who you are as a person, and I’ve already told you that I think you’re pretty.”

Felicity crossed her arms in front of her. When her basket banged against Thomas in the process, she wasn’t sorry.

“I just don’t want to do what Malcolm wants. You wouldn’t understand. He’s not your father.”

“He might be,” Felicity said and then chomped down on her lip and turned away, but not before she saw his startled look. She hadn’t meant to discuss that possibility with anyone but Dally.

“What do you mean?” he asked.

She started walking in the direction of the Veter gate. Thomas ran up behind her and put his hand on her shoulder. “You can’t say something like that and then walk away. What did you mean?”

Felicity reached up and removed his hand, but then she saw the distressed look on his face. “I meant, I don’t know who my father was, but I know that Malcolm was involved with my mother, and at the first harvest party I had a distinct memory of him holding me and laughing. It made me think he knew me pretty well when I was little.”

“Do you remember anything else about him?”

“Not really,” she said. “My mother married Dally when I was about five years old. I know we used to live in a very nice house, though. It was on a hill and had a yellow door. My mother, she was involved with several angels before she married.”

Thomas rubbed his hand across his mouth. “So you could be my sister,” he said, grimacing.

“Your half-sister, yes, and I don’t know. It’s very possible that Malcolm didn’t know either.”

“There’s very little Malcolm doesn’t know,” Thomas said, sighing. “But at least I managed to pick the best person for this charade. That was lucky. If there is any chance Malcolm is your father, he won’t want me to marry you. He’ll be desperate to avoid it.”  

“I suppose that is a bright spot,” Felicity said.

“And _I_ suppose that you should start calling me Tommy,” he said. “Since we’re related.” His smile was back. “This should make the flying less awkward too. I’ll just think of you as a bag I’m carrying. A little sister bag.”

“A bag!” she said and then yelped when he picked her up and flung them both into the air.

 

>>\--->

 

The atmosphere in the square of Veter had shifted radically in the days since Felicity had last visited. The market was still open, but as in Ogon, the prices of anything edible had increased threefold. Today there was a crowd gathering before their clan leader Hugo’s house. The people of Veter were clearly dissatisfied with the situation as it was.

“Come out! Come out!” they yelled.

“Will we have enough food?”

“Why aren’t we preparing to fight?”

Someone threw a rock at the thick oaken door. “Zemlya and Voda are getting ready. Why aren’t we?”

“This could get ugly in a hurry,” Tommy said. “Where is Sobena’s shop?”

“It’s in an alley in the oldest part of the quarter,” Felicity said. “Just fly me up.” He picked her up again, and she pointed in the right direction. “See that narrow spot there?” Tommy nodded, and she clutched him tightly as he eased them down between buildings.

Within a couple of minutes they were knocking on the door. An old woman answered. She opened the door and squinted out. “Who is it?” she asked. “Coins only today - or food. That’s what I’ll take.”

Felicity forced a smile. “We have money,” she said. “And you know me. I’m Felicity, the librarian’s daughter. I’ve brought Angel Thomas with me.”

Sobena slowly looked them over, pursing her lips. “I can’t promise I have what you need,” she said. “I haven’t been able to forage for over a month. You can come inside, though.” She eased open the heavy door, and they walked inside.

Felicity didn’t particularly care for Sobena, but she loved her shop. There were canisters, boxes, sacks, and glass bottles everywhere. Dried flowers and plants hung from the ceiling, and the front window - the only place light entered the shop - was filled with live plants that Sobena and her clients harvested as necessary. A fat gray cat sat on the top of a rickety table in front of the plants, licking its front paws. To the left of the table was a row of shelves, including one containing only bottles of oils. She was fairly certain one of them was elf leaf oil. What a relief. She smiled at Tommy.

“What do you need?” Sobena asked. She put a hand out to pet the top of her cat’s head, but it batted her hand away.

“Do you have any angelica root?” Felicity asked.

“A little,” Sobena said, moving towards one of her jars. “I can give you a small cup full.” She opened the jar and began to pour some out into the small fabric bag Felicity handed her.  

“Whatever you can spare,” Felicity said. “I also need some elf leaf oil, and I’m sure you’re the only healer in the city who will have it.” Sobena was as susceptible to flattery as anyone, she’d found.

As soon as the words left her mouth, however, Sobena froze. “Elf leaf oil? No, I’m afraid not. I haven’t had any since first planting. I had to use all of mine up for the rituals.”

“But,” Felicity said. “Your oil shelf is so comprehensive. Surely one of those vials has some. If I could only have a look; I’m sure it’s there.”

Tommy was looking between Felicity and Sobena with curiosity. He moved closer to Sobena and said, in a low voice, “It’s very important, and my father and I would be quite grateful if you could provide Felicity with some.”

“I’m sorry,” Sobena said, giving him a startled look. “I don’t have it. You owe me half a copper for this angelica, and if that’s it, I’ll bid you goodbye. I’m an old woman, and I need to rest.”

Felicity dug down into her pocket and pulled out the coin. There was obviously nothing she could do to persuade Sobena to sell her the oil, so she took the little bag of angelica, and she and Tommy eased out past the gray cat and the plant wilderness and into the alley again.

 

>>\--->

 

“Is that how the old bag behaves normally?” Tommy asked when they were outside.

“Not really,” Felicity said. “She’s usually very keen to make a profit. Frankly, she was acting very oddly. I think she had the elf leaf oil.”

“I do too,” Tommy said, and it vaguely surprised her that he had an opinion on this or had been paying attention to what had been going on. “What do we do now?”

“I don’t know,” she said. “I don’t have quite enough angelica root. I can probably find someone else in the city who has more, but Sobena’s the only one who has the proper glassware to distill this type of oil.”

Tommy looked thoughtful. “How important is this?”

“Very important to me, and possibly incredibly important to Zvyozda. I’m not sure, though.”

“I know my father keeps some herbs and oils for study and research,” he said. “It’s possible he may have some elf leaf oil that I could get for you. Do you want to try?”

“Please,” she said. “Thank you, Tommy.”

 

>>\--->

 

Tommy took them through the back entrance of his father’s house. “It’s better if we just sneak around for this,” he said. “That’s generally how I approach anything to do with Malcolm.”

Felicity had walked past this imposing structure thousands of time in her life, but she’d never been inside before. She was astonished to see how beautiful it was. Unlike nearly every other building in Zvyozda, the stone of the mountain wasn’t visible inside. Instead, every wall and every floor was covered - with marble, with tapestries, or with wooden paneling. The furniture was intricately carved from hardwood, stained dark and shining. It looked like someone had finished polishing it minutes before. The smell of beeswax lingered in the air.

Tommy lead her from the back kitchen to the front of the house and into a room that overlooked the square. She could see shadows of people coming and going through the thick glass of the window. “If he’s got any of the items on your list, they would be in here,” he said. He closed the door to the room behind them, and walked over to a cabinet built into the wall. It had a complicated looking lock on it, but Tommy spun it left and right, and it fell open.

“We deal in secrets in this house,” he said with a twist of a smile. “If you don’t know any secrets, you have nothing to barter with.” He slid a panel of the cabinet open, and behind it were a number of shelves filled with vials, boxes, and glass and metal jars. Tommy began rifling through them, frowning. Felicity moved toward him to help when the door to the room opened and Malcolm walked in. He stopped as soon as he saw Tommy.

“Tommy,” he said, “may I ask why you are grubbing through my belongings? I believe we’ve talked before about your presence being unwanted in this room.”

Felicity saw Tommy’s shoulders slump as he removed his fingers from the vial he’d been touching. A tension rippled up his back muscles as he turned to face his father.

“It was me, sir,” Felicity said before she realized she was talking. “Angel Malcolm, I mean. I asked him to help me find a couple of herbs for a healing salve I need to make.”

Malcolm pivoted on his heel and looked at her. The corners of his mouth tipped up a fraction. “Felicity,” he said. “Ransacking my cabinet was your idea, you say? How did you even know I had any herbal supplies? Or a cabinet. Or a room, for that matter?”

She swallowed. She saw out of the corner of her eye that Tommy’s mouth was open and his eyes were wide. “Yes, it was my idea,” she said, lifting her chin and ignoring his other questions.

“Well, that alters the situation,” Malcolm said. He walked over to the desk in the room and sat down in the chair behind it, motioning to another chair in the room. “Please sit down,” he said, turning to Tommy: “Try not to break anything as you remove your thieving arm and yourself from my presence.”

Tommy’s eyes immediately went to Felicity’s, but she couldn’t see how he could protect her now. Malcolm was the head of her clan, and he’d caught them both in the process of stealing from him. Tommy couldn’t do anything to save her from whatever punishment he was about to dole out. She nodded at him and gave a tiny shrug of her shoulders. He stared at her until she jerked her head towards the door, and then he walked toward it slowly and exited. She felt strangely grateful that he was so reluctant to leave her here with Malcolm, but whatever Malcolm was going to do to her, it was best to find out now.

She turned her attention back to Malcolm who had steepled his hands and was looking at her intently. “If Tommy is at all predictable,” he said, “he brought you in the back way and dragged you through the house. So how do you like it?”

Felicity’s eyebrows lowered and she shook her head. She couldn’t have heard him right. “Excuse me, sir?”

“My house,” Malcolm said. “How do you like it? Is it to your taste?”

“It’s very fine,” she said after a moment. “I’m sure it’s the most elegant place I’ve ever been.”

He smiled. “It is rather elegant, isn’t it? My grandfather had the marble for the floors brought in from a mine in southern Ogon, and one of the tapestries dates back to antiquity.”

She stared at him. He was, in middle age, still a handsome angel. His black hair curled gently, and a streak of gray fell over his forehead. His eyes were a piercing blue. Normally she would have called them icy, but right now they were almost warm as he surveyed the room and her. His wings, at rest behind him and trailing on the floor, were gray like Tommy’s but tipped with black like they’d been individually dipped in ink. He was dressed immaculately in a blue silk tunic and tailored gray pants tucked into black leather boots. Oh, Mother, she thought and sighed inwardly. Did you have to?

“You have a salve you need to make?” he asked.

She nodded. “I have an, um, a boil I need to heal, and the recipe I got from Brana calls for elf leaf oil. I have elf leaf, of course, but not the oil.”

He gave her a slow perusal. “A boil.”

“Yes, Angel Malcolm,” she said.

“Please call me Malcolm,” he said and waved a hand. “Would you show me? I have a little familiarity with herbs and herb lore.”

Felicity twisted her hands together. “I’d rather not, sir,” she said. “For modesty’s sake.”

His smile was cool and amused. “Very nice,” he said, and she had a feeling he wasn’t referring to her observance of propriety. He stood and walked to the cabinet where he began picking up various vials and pulling the stoppers out. “Elf leaf oil,” he said, sniffing one. “Very distinctive smell. Cool and fresh, part of the mint family. How much do you need?”

She felt her jaw begin to open, and she tightened it. “Only about a spoonful, sir,” she said.

“Malcolm,” he said. He opened a drawer and pulled out a glass bottle and then poured at least twice that inside. “Is this enough? Did you need anything else?”

“Yes,” she said, swallowing. “That’s very satisfactory. And, well, if you have any angelica root, I wouldn’t say no.” Why not ask? If she left this house alive, she’d have everything she needed to reverse the spell on Dally.

“Angelica root,” he said, chuckling. “But you don’t like angels.”

“I…” she said. “I--”

“It’s not a flaw,” he said. “Angels haven’t always been good to your family. Or you.” He found a small drawstring bag in another drawer, uncorked a jar, and began filling it. “Please tell me when.”

She realized he’d already poured a generous amount. “Oh. Oh! When,” she said. “That’s certainly enough. I won’t need that much.”

“For some other necessity then,” Malcolm said. “Angelica root is very versatile. Like the angels it’s named for, it’s powerful.” He held the bag and the bottle out to her, and she stood and crossed the room to take them.

“This is very generous of you, uh, Malcolm,” she said.

“Not at all,” he said. “It’s really the least I can do for you. Is Adalbert taking care of you? You aren’t short on food yet, are you?”

“No, we have enough,” she said. “But I’ve heard that in Zemlya and Voda they are rationing. Have you considered doing that in Ogon? Because I can’t see Dally and me hiding and eating when our neighbors are starving to death.”

“He would give your food away?” Malcolm asked.

“We couldn’t keep it,” she said. “It wouldn’t be right. Not when others are starving.”

“And Adalbert taught you always to do right,” Malcolm said, raising his eyebrows. “For instance, not stealing.” He raised his hands up in front of him. “I’m not upset. You may go now, if you like.”

She blushed but continued to meet his stare. “I try to do what’s right,” she said. “Sometimes it’s difficult to tell what that is.” She turned and walked to the door. As she was opening it, she heard him twisting the cabinet’s lock back into place. Tumbler after tumbler fell, each with a heavy thud.

 

>>\--->

 

As soon as Felicity closed the door to Malcolm’s room, Tommy grabbed her arm and she yelped.

“Shh,” he said in a loud whisper. “Let’s get you out of here.” He dragged her through the hall and to the front door, opened it, and pulled them both through. When they were down the steps and in the street, he stopped and faced her. “Are you alright? What went on in there?”

“I’m fine,” she said, stepping away from him and balancing herself on her feet. “He didn’t do anything to me.”

Tommy looked her over. “You don’t seem too shaken up, but sometimes the head doesn’t know it’s dead even after it’s been severed from the body.”

Felicity wrinkled her nose. “Thank you for that lovely metaphor, but Malcolm was actually quite personable. Solicitous, even. He gave me the elf leaf oil and some angelica root.”

Tommy laughed.

“No, he did,” she said, pushing her basket into his face. “Look.”

Tommy stared down at the glass bottle and the small bag in surprise. “He gave them to you,” he said.

“Yes.”

“And what did he ask _from_ you?”

“Nothing,” she said. “He wanted me to have them. He even inquired if I had enough to eat.”

Tommy narrowed his eyes. “You said these supplies are important. How important?”

“Very,” she said. “What? Are you saying you want me to give them back?”

“Malcolm doesn’t give anything away for free,” Tommy said. “There’s always something he wants in return.”

“Well, he didn’t mention a price or anything he wanted,” she said, and then she blinked and shook her head. “You were okay with me having them if we stole them from him.”

“Because he wouldn’t know you had them. That you _owed_ him,” Tommy said.

“I don’t _owe_ him anything,” she said, pointing a finger at him. “And I do need them, so I’m going to keep them, alright?”

“Alright,” Tommy said, stepping back and putting a hand up.

“Maybe,” Felicity said, “maybe he wants to make it up to me because he feels regret about my mother. And me.”

“Felicity,” Tommy said, “Malcolm doesn’t have regrets. Malcolm has goals and objectives. Don’t romanticize him. He’s charming. He’s handsome and powerful. He’s very savvy, but he’s not at all kind. I’m in a unique position to know.”

She looked at him again. His face was very earnest, and she wondered… “Tommy, he’s not going to do anything to you because he caught you in his cabinet, is he?”

Tommy let out a breath. “Don’t worry about me,” he said. “I’ve got a system worked out for dealing with my father’s moods.”

“A system?”

“This time it will likely involve staying with Oliver for a few days.” He smiled and his blue eyes crinkled up in the corners of his handsome face. “It’ll be fine. We should get out of here. Ready to go home?” He held out his arm to her.

She hesitated. “Do we have to fly?”

“Not if you don’t mind walking through Ogon with an angel escort.”

“I don’t mind,” she said and was surprised to realize it was true.

 

>>\--->

 

The sun was easing its way down Mount Lyeda when Felicity crossed the cobbles of the square to her own home and bid Tommy goodbye. She closed the front door behind her and checked the contents of her basket again. Yes, it was all there. She heard echoes of a conversation in the back of the house and walked down the hall, past the stairs, and in the direction of her father’s voice. Was he laughing?

“Do they still have that little bakery that sells the cheese pastries - the one that’s next to the central library in Celestia?” Dally asked. “Waldhar would stop there and sample the bread and the smoked ham - on his way to the angel court.”

“They do,” Oliver said, “but the quality has gone down. The baker’s son runs it now, and he cuts corners to save money, even though the prices are just as high.”

“Nothing stays the same,” Dally said, shaking his head. “Those were damn fine pastries, son. The cheese melted in the most exceptional way.”

Felicity stepped into the room, and, for the second before Dally or Oliver saw her, she saw her father’s lingering smile and his gentle head shake. She felt warmth spread through her - not in her hands this time, though. Somewhere in her chest the warmth and pressure grew as she realized Dally was talking about Celestia. He was reminiscing about the place where he’d been a slave, and he was doing this with an angel. A minor miracle was occurring right in their small sitting room amongst all the books and the papers, over a couple of half drunk mugs of chai and a plate of roasted tikva seeds. How had this happened?

Then he saw her, and his round face lightened even more. “Felicity,” he said. “Back so soon?”

Oliver swiveled on his stool, his wings sweeping the floor, raising tiny puffs of dust visible in the light that streamed from the window. His eyebrows were raised, and his lips tipped up to match.

“Do you have everything you need?” he asked, and she wondered if maybe she did. She shook her head at the odd thought, and put her basket gently on the table.

“I did,” she said. “It’s a long story, but it was actually Malcolm who gave me the elf leaf oil.”

“Malcolm,” Dally said. “Malcolm knows you went looking for these ingredients?”

“We couldn’t get the oil anywhere else. Brana only had the agrimony, and Sobena refused to sell us the elf leaf oil or admit she even had it. So Tommy said he would check his father’s supplies, and, unfortunately, Malcolm caught us while he was doing that. But he wasn’t angry at me. I’m not sure why. He asked what I needed and gave it to me.”

“You said, ‘Tommy,’” Dally said. “Since when do you call him Tommy?”

“Malcolm gave it to you,” Oliver said, looking over at Dally.

“Yes,” she said. “The important thing is that I found the ingredients and now we can do the spell. Or we can in a few days when the moon is waning again. It’s too full now to do a reversal spell.” 

The two men looking at her made her feel self-conscious and in a strange way. Oliver should be the odd man out here - the angel out. No one had ever penetrated the thicket of loyalty she and Dally had for each other, but they had the same expression on their faces right now. She knew it was different than the one on hers. It was concern, but not exactly. Both of them had furrowed brows and Oliver was nodding slowly. Were they _humoring_ her?

“What?” she said.

Dally stood up and ran his hand down her arm. “It’s nothing,” he said. “You know how I feel about Malcolm, and why is he helping you _now_?”

“I don’t know,” she said. “He probably remembers Mama. You say I look like her now.”

“You always looked like her, and that didn’t stop him from ignoring you before.”

“Yes, well, we have what we need now, and we can help you, Dally. There’s nothing Malcolm can do about it. You can’t spoil kasha with butter.”

There they were, looking at each other again. Oliver stood up. “If you need my help with the spell, let me know when you are ready, and I will come.” He nodded at Dally as he threw a leather satchel over his shoulder. “I will take your advice to heart, sir.”

“Don’t forget what I asked you to do,” Dally said.

“I won’t,” Oliver said. He passed Felicity on his way to the door, and she felt a tiny flutter as his arm almost brushed hers. It was in her throat, though, this time, and she was afraid she knew what that meant.

This angel could touch her without touching her. It wasn’t a gift; it was a power, and Felicity had never let any angel have that over her. Not if she could help it.


	10. The Skalvians Approach

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Oliver flies out to investigate a looming threat, Dally and Felicity cope with chaos in Zemlya, and Malcolm makes his move.

When Oliver woke the next morning, he looked out his balcony window and saw a thick cloud of smoke in the distance. His heart skipped a beat in his chest. He blinked his eyes firmly and opened them again. It was still there far into the distance, but visible: dark smoke. Something was burning.

He threw on an old tunic, his pants, and his boots, and descended two flights of stairs, dodging children and an old man until the reached the second floor. He hoped Tommy was still there, camped out in the library. He was, slumped on the low reclining couch, his wings covered him and one hand draped on the floor.

“Tommy,” Oliver said, “get up! We need to go. I see smoke in the distance. I think the Skalvians are approaching, and we need to find out what is happening.”

“What?” Tommy asked, his arm raising to brush the dark hair from his face. “What?”

“I don’t have time to explain,” Oliver said. “Just put something on. I’ll go get Barry and round up the angel corps. Meet me in the square in ten minutes.” He turned and strode out the door.

 

>>\--->

 

 

Five hours later the angels found the source of the smoke. It was the central meeting hall of a village so small Oliver didn’t know its name. By the time he, Barry, and Tommy had alighted on the ground, the roof had collapsed onto at least a hundred people. The doors were barricaded from the outside, and charred hands clawed at what remained of them from the inside. There were no survivors.

They searched the remaining buildings. None of them had been touched, and in the second to last of the houses, Tommy found a baby napping in a cradle. She was clutching a rag doll in one chubby fist, chewing on its soft hand in her sleep. She was firmly swaddled, but when Oliver put his arms under her soft body to lift her up, he felt the telltale tension of her wings under the thin linen. What was an angel baby doing here?

Oliver gave the baby to Tommy. “Fly her home to Zvyozda and give her to Mila to care for,” he said, “then go to your father and tell him what has happened. The guard needs to open the sluices from the aqueducts and fill the moat. The Skalvians are less than two days away now.”

Tommy nestled the baby under one arm. “What if he doesn’t believe me?” he asked.

“Tell him first and then everyone else, and don’t wait for their response,” Oliver said. He pulled his clan ring off his hand. “Give this to Maximilian and inform him that every angel is needed to help out here before we close the castle gates.”

Tommy slid the ring on his right hand, nodded, and sprung into the air.

Oliver divided the angels with them into Zemlyans and Vodans, and he charged the Zemlyans with evacuating the remaining three villages that remained in the path of the Skalvians. The Vodan angels he told to scavenge everything possible from all the abandoned villages on the plain, livestock, grain, anything in any way edible, and load, carry, or drive it to the village of Turza. This was the village he and his father had fought side by side to defend all of those years ago. It was located to the west of Zvyozda and was not on the plain or directly in front of the Skalvians, so Oliver hoped that it was safe for the moment. Its hidden entrance to the castle would come in handy once again.

He and Barry continued flying south. Oliver knew from his time in the corps that he needed to determine the Skalvians advancement strategy now while the evidence was fresh. He also knew it wouldn’t be a pleasant task. He was right. Not every village had burned buildings or fields. In some the Skalvians had simply hacked farmers to death in the fields. In another they had hung a dozen children on a crudely built gallows. Surrounding this structure were the bodies of the adults. They had their hands tied behind their backs and each of them had been stabbed through the heart with a sword.

Pigs, dogs, and horses roamed freely, and cows in fields lowed pitifully, waiting to be milked. This was strange. As an angel in the corps, Oliver had requisitioned his share of food from villages, but these Skalvians didn’t seem to be concerned about gathering supplies. Most of the crops still grew in their farrows, and in the two villages he and Barry landed in the stores were still there.

Another mystery was the large circle of dead vegetation left behind where the Skalvians had camped. The first time they came across this phenomenon, Barry reached down and examined the grass. “It’s not burned,” he said. “It’s dead. Dessicated. Like the life was sucked from it somehow.” He picked a blade from the ground, but it fell apart in his fingers. “I can’t imagine what would cause this.”

Flying overhead, they noticed these spots appeared every twenty versts or so. They weren’t present at every campsite, but where they were no life existed. The roaming beasts avoided them. Bird song died off anywhere near them. Even the air inside them felt to thin to breathe.

Between the nameless village and Baranov they saw no one, not one living person. When they reached Baranov, however, Oliver saw smoke coming from a chimney in one of the larger houses, and his gift began to spread its warmth through his body and into his arms. There was something here he should locate or learn. He motioned to Barry to stay quiet and follow him. He landed at the back of the house and eased around the corner, not sure of what he might have to confront to get to what he was meant to find. What he saw through the open door was not what he’d expected. An enormous, heavily muscled man with tanned skin and dark hair sat nearly naked in front of the fireplace. He was holding a needle in the flame, and Oliver watched as he tried to stitch without wincing the last bit of a long slice on his hip. Behind him Barry moved, and the man suddenly stilled.

“Who’s there?” he called and reached down to retrieve his sword. Oliver entered the house with his hands upraised.

“Not the enemy,” he said in a calm voice. “We’re from Zvyozda, and we’re trying to determine what has happened to South Karelia,” he said.

“There is no South Karelia,” the man said, still clutching his sword. “There hasn’t been for at least a week. There is only West Skalvia now, filled with Zemlyan bone and ash.”  

Barry eased his way out from behind Oliver. “Do you need help with that?” he asked, pointing to the man’s wound. “It’s hard to sew your own back closed.”

The huge man stared at the both of them for a full minute and finally relaxed. “It is,” he said.

Barry went over and knelt beside the man. “Have you always been alone here?” he asked.

The man gave a bitter smile. “Here in this village? Yes. But when I started this journey, I did so with two hundred men, marching out to meet the enemy and vanquish them.”

“Where are they now?” Barry asked. “Are they foraging for food or supplies?”

“They’re all dead,” the man said. “Everyone but me. I hope you have a better plan to defeat the Skalvians than we did, or everyone in Zvyozda Castle will be too before long.” He offered his hand to Oliver. “My name is Darek, and I’m glad to know you for however long that will be.”

 

>>\--->

 

 

News of the Skalvian approach sent the castle into a panic. For two nights Felicity slept poorly, waiting for their attack. The sky filled with angels’ wings, and people from the countryside streamed in over the filling moat and through the gates. The castle guard set up a group to vet each person before letting them cross the water, but this put no one at ease. It was hard to worry about spies when the cloud of black smoke on the steppe grew larger and closer by the hour.

The streets were full of people day and night, and some of the new refugees told the most frightening stories. Felicity felt like crawling back into her bed and crying, but she tended to the wounded brought back by the angels and dried their tears instead. Dally supervised the effort to bring in more supplies. He had maps of all the entrances to the castle through the mountains, and he created a rotating guard to man them at all times.

“We will need every chicken and bag of wheat and more besides,” he kept muttering. “We can be grateful that Oliver was the one in charge of this because some of this food may actually go to us.”

On the third day of smoke, the angels returned to Zvyozda, the last of the refugees crossed the drawbridge, and the castle guard closed the gates to prepare for the worst. It did not come. Instead a thin line of white-headed soldiers rode the remainder of the distance and began to pitch their tents. The city watched them as they meticulously unrolled bleached white canvas and pounded smooth wooden stakes into the sloped ground. If it rained, they would not be camped in a pool. The water would flow down into the valley.

The castle was still busy with its preparations, but no one gossiped in the streets now. They hurried about, getting their chores done, combing the market for foodstuffs that were now priced at ten times what they’d been a week ago. On the third night, just before sunset, Felicity saw Oliver fly over the castle walls with another angel. They were carrying a large man between them, and they looked grim. She knew she should be worried, but regardless of what the dark man’s presence meant, Felicity thought she might actually sleep tonight. Oliver was back, and that meant that someone capable was in charge again.

She sighed in relief and climbed the stairs to her bedroom on the third floor. Their house, like most of those in Zvyozda, was built tall and narrow to make the most of the limited space within the castle. The third floor had only two rooms: hers and Dally’s. The stone stairs were old and grooved from hundreds of years of use, but she knew them so well, she didn’t even need her rushlight. As her sight line topped the stairwell, she craned her neck to see what Dally was doing in his room and saw that he was busy scratching something out on vellum at his desk. The last remains of the daylight filtered through the double doors that led to his balcony, and he was squinting against the light.

Felicity loved Dally’s balcony. The house Zvyozda provided for its librarian was in no way lavish, but it was high up in the castle’s landscape. From this balcony she could see the majority of its houses and shops, down to the castle’s walls, beyond to the river and the concave landscape of the valley. It was, under better circumstances, a beautiful view from all angles.

When she was little, she would squeeze her skinny legs through the openings in the railing and dangle her bare feet above the heads of the people below, snapping her toes at anyone she didn’t like. Sometimes she would fling flower petals down and watch where they would land to see what fortune would be hers that day, that year. That was how she’d met Kalina, her first friend in Ogon: she’d sent down a bouquet’s worth of petals on her head accidentally, and Kalina had laughed and laughed at the “flower rain.”

Dally didn’t lift his head when she entered his room, but he grunted. She crossed over and kissed him on the back of his head where a thin circle of hair still remained. She peered at what he was writing, but before she could read it, he shoved it aside and turned to her.

“Malcolm announced today that food supplies would be communal and that rationing would begin,” he said.

“I know,” she said, blowing out her rushlight. “It’s all anyone was talking about in the shops. People were hurrying to buy any food that could still be purchased so they could hide it away before Malcolm’s angels could get it.”

“I’m a bit surprised he did that. I didn’t anticipate that he’d embrace any of Oliver’s changes.”

“Everyone’s in such a panic now, so maybe that’s why. But I did talk to him about this a few days ago when he gave me the elf leaf oil,” Felicity said. “I mentioned that we would not be able to eat if our friends and neighbors were starving around us. Maybe that’s another reason for why he changed his mind.”

“You said that?” Dally asked, in a startled voice.

“I thought he should know,” she said. “So he could help Ogon like Oliver is helping Zemlya.”

Dally frowned for a moment and then put his arm around her waist. “Malcolm is rarely altruistic. I’m sure his reasons will eventually become apparent, but you give me too much credit, my dear. There’s only one person I’d starve to death for, and that’s you.”

“Let’s neither of us starve to death,” Felicity said, leaning her head on his.

“An excellent idea,” he said and smiled. “I’m still working on that.”

“I thought so. Let me know if I can help.” She pulled away and began walking toward her room. “I’m going to study a little while there’s a bit of light still. Good night.”

“Night, owlet,” Dally said. He pulled the vellum back in front of himself again. “May it remain peaceful.”

Felicity slipped out of his room and into her own. She grabbed one of the books about Skalvian history and then settled into her bed. Her window faced west and was open to let out the heat that had gathered upstairs during the day. She wanted to read and learn something that might help, but her mind held too many thoughts and memories of her girlhood in this castle. They were distracting her. She thought again about Malcolm and his generosity. Despite everything she knew and felt about angels and the words of Tommy and Dally, she wanted to like him. Worse, she wanted him to like her.

Her mother had told her that when Felicity had been really small, she’d prayed regularly to Matka Zemlya to give her a father. She would lay candles, flowers, and small sweets on the little corner altar of their home in petition. All of the other children she knew had fathers, and she wanted one too. When they’d met Dally, her prayers had been answered - not in the way she’d thought they would be but just as well. Better.

She thought about Tommy and his secrets, how he’d never thought to _ask_ his father for the angelica root or the oil, and how resigned he’d been to Malcolm’s anger and disdain. She’d been lucky she’d been able to grow up in this house and not in Malcolm’s. Dally had only ever been one door over ready to rush to her in the night if she had a nightmare. Dally had never made her feel small or unwanted. He’d always believed she could do anything he’d asked, and the only things she’d kept from him were her silly crushes and some schoolgirl gossip. Dally was there right now, ready to rush in if the Skalvians did anything tonight.

By now the last rays of daylight had faded away, and the room was dark. She set her book carefully on the floor underneath her bed and snuggled under her light wool blanket. She wasn’t cold, but she still liked to sleep beneath its weight. She clenched the blanket in her hand and closed her eyes. Why was life so complicated? You wanted what you didn’t have and didn’t appreciate what you did. Like peace. And contentment.

Sometime later she woke. Light from the gibbous moon now filled her room. Had she heard something? Was it the Skalvians? She tensed and waited for minute. It might have been the neighbor’s cat again, scrambling up the fence that separated their tiny back gardens. Her eyelids fluttered closed again, and then she heard a great bang and scramble. Something was definitely happening in their house, and it wasn’t the cat.

“Dally?”  

A muffled noise came back to her call, and she sat up in bed. There were footsteps now in the other room and the sound of a struggle.

“ _Dally_?” Felicity threw her blanket back and somehow got on her feet. She ran towards her father’s room, but his door was now closed. She pounded on the door with her fists. “What’s happening? Dally, are you alright?”

Louder noises, a thump, and the sound of something large being dragged came from behind the door. She shoved her shoulder against it and pushed with her entire weight, and it cracked open. Something was blocking it on the other side. She put her back to it and shoved with both her legs, and whatever it was moved inch by inch as the noises from inside the room halted. When the door was half open, Felicity slid herself through the gap, and worked her way around the large object -  Dally’s desk - that had been the barrier she’d been struggling against. As she pulled herself through the space, she lifted her head and saw that the doors to the balcony were wide open now.

The remnants of the curtain there fluttered in the gentle night air. It had been ripped in half by the struggle, and on top of the length of the fabric on the floor lay a white feather. Felicity hauled herself up from the floor and ran to the the balcony. “Dally!” she screamed.

By the light of the still too full moon she saw angels in flight. They were already halfway to the castle’s walls with their burden, and she couldn’t see who they were, but she watched their wings beat violently together in time as they carried the person she loved most in the world away from her and down, down, down to the earth, depositing her father in a heap before the largest tent of the Skalvian encampment.

 

>>\--->

 

Felicity didn’t realize that she’d fainted until Kalina’s face was in hers and she felt her cheek being lightly slapped.

“Wake up, wake up, Felicity,” Kalina said, and Felicity felt her raw and swollen eyes and remembered what had happened.

“Dally!” she said, and Kalina shook her head.

“He’s gone. Do you know what happened?”

Felicity sat up. “The angels took him. They flew him over the castle and dropped him in front of the Skalvians’ tents.” She picked herself up off the floor and looked out over the railing. The moon was behind a cloud now, and she couldn’t see anything that far away. “We have to get him back!”

“How?” Kalina asked, and someone behind her echoed the idea. Felicity turned around. The room was full of neighbors and friends, and more people were gathered in the street below.

“I don’t know!” Felicity said. All she knew was that Dally was in terrible danger, and she had to do something. “I should...I should…” She wandered about Dally’s room, picking up his pen, staring at his toppled desk. Just then a shadow blocked out any light above, and she looked up to see Tommy and Oliver descending onto the balcony.

“What’s happened?” Oliver said.

“How did you...?” Felicity asked.

“It’s all over Zvyozda that the librarian was taken, but no one knows what’s going on,” Tommy said. “They only know they saw him carried out of the castle. They probably wouldn’t know who it was except that they heard you scream his name over and over.”

A third angel, the thin brown haired one she’d seen with Oliver earlier that evening, flew in and landed next to Tommy. “The Council of Angels is calling an emergency meeting,” he said. “We need to be in the Great Hall within the hour, and we need to bring Adalbert’s daughter.” He nodded to Felicity solemnly. “I’m very sorry, miss.”

Oliver turned to Felicity. “Do you have anyone to--” He stopped when he saw Kalina. “Oh,”

he said. “Kalina, is that right?”

Kalina stared at all of them and nodded.

“Can you take her and get her dressed? We need to leave in a few minutes, and she can’t be in her nightgown.”

“Yes,” Kalina said. “Yes, of course, I can.” She took Felicity by the arm. “Let’s go straighten you out.” She turned back to Oliver. “Can you get the rest of these people out of here before you have to go?”

Oliver turned to the other angel, and he nodded. “I can take care of it,” he said. “You go.”

“I’ll get her there,” Tommy said, and the rest faded away as Kalina herded her off the balcony and toward her room.

 

>>\--->

 

The Great Hall was bright with candles - this was the castle’s third emergency meeting this week - but they dispelled none of Felicity’s inner darkness or fear. She leaned on Tommy as he brought her inside and over to the dias at the back of the room. In front of the dias, four sets of benches were placed, and he led her over to one of them. She saw several Ogon council members in this section, but she didn’t greet them. She was too numb.

Within a few minutes of their arrival, the room began filling up with angels and local leaders.

The Council of Angels began sitting in chairs on the dais. Malcolm arrived and came up to Tommy. “Thank you for bringing her,” he said and put a hand on Felicity’s arm. “I was shocked to hear about Adalbert, and I assure you we will do what we can to restore him to you.” He walked up the steps to the dais and took a chair in the center.

Oliver was the last angel to arrive. He carried his large satchel and was followed by that same angel again. His eyes met hers as he passed her, but he didn’t speak. Hugo and Maximilian nodded at him, and he took the remaining empty chair on the dais.

“Shall we begin?” Malcolm asked, and the angels nodded in agreement.

“We’ve called this meeting,” Malcolm said, “to learn the details of the abduction of Zvyozda’s librarian, Adalbert, from his home tonight and decide what is to be done about it. The Council of Angels would like to extend its sympathies to his daughter,” he nodded to Felicity, “and to express that we will do everything we can to determine how this happened.”

“I think we’ve got a decent idea of how it happened,” Tommy muttered underneath his breath.

“The question we should be asking is why Adalbert was taken,” Hugo said. “Does anyone here think he might have been a spy for the Skalvians?”

Dozens of voices rose at once discussing that possibility until Maximilian said loudly, “Oh, for the love of Byelobog, that’s absurd. If Adalbert were a spy, why would angels have taken him to the Skalvians and out in the open? It’s not as though Adalbert doesn’t intimately know the castle’s tunnel system. The question we should be asking is: ‘Who were the angels who took him?’”

“And why?” Oliver asked.

Maximilian nodded in agreement. “And why.”

A man in the Veter section stood up, but Hugo ignored him. He signalled that he had a question.

"What was it about Adalbert that made him a target?" Oliver asked. The angels on the dias looked uncomfortable. "Is it because he had been outspoken against some of the decisions the Council of Angels made?"

"It was probably a personal grudge," Hugo said. "He was a thoroughly unpleasant man." The man in Veter signalled more energetically at this.

Maximilian waved a hand in his direction. "Shall we let this man speak?"

Malcolm nodded at the man, and he came forward and stood in front of the dias. "Pardon me, my angels, but many of us here are wondering if this is an isolated incident. How are we supposed to know that we won't be taken up and tossed to the Skalvians at any time?" Behind him many people nodded and shouted agreement.

Maximilian looked startled, and several of the other angels looked offended. "I can't imagine this happening again," Malcolm said in a placating voice.

"I beg the patience of the angels," the man in front of the dias said, "but did you imagine it happening _this time_?"

Felicity felt ill watching this interplay. "Look at them," she said to Tommy. "They're only concerned about themselves and about how they can be safe, and who knows what is happening to Dally right now?" She thought of his body dropping, hitting the ground, and crumpling, and she wondered if he were still alive. They could be torturing him right now - or _branding_ him the way they’d branded Oliver - and she had no way of knowing or stopping them. Just a handful of hours ago, she'd kissed him and told him good night, and now she might never see his face again. She didn’t want hear any of this. She didn’t want to be here. She should be at home going through Dally’s things looking for some way to fix this -- or poring through the Skalvian texts -- anything but sitting here while these people tiptoed around the angels and the angels danced out of their way.

Tommy nudged her. "I know this is awful," he said, "and I don't want to make you suffer it, but you should pay attention here. They're talking about you." Surprised, she looked up at the dais and saw that Malcolm had a curious tension about him.

“We will need to appoint someone to the librarian position,” he said, indicating Anton in the crowd. “I’m sure the Council of Angels will agree that it’s wise to promote Adalbert's apprentice, Anton, to the position of librarian now, certainly in his absence. We now have desperate need of a researcher. The position, of course, comes with all of its usual responsibilities and benefits, including housing.”

Felicity sat up. Dally was gone mere hours, and they were appointing a new librarian and installing him in her house? Surely Anton wouldn't agree to this? To her surprise she saw that he was nodding and smiling. The traitor. He could barely find whole sections of the library, let alone read the books.

"Which mean the council needs to make accommodation for the librarian’s daughter," Malcolm said. "It would be inappropriate for her to remain there when Anton takes up residence, and no one wishes to see her homeless in addition to the tragic loss of her father."

Malcolm caught Felicity's eyes and held them with his stare. "I propose that she should be installed in my house. My son, Tommy, has indicated--"

Beside her Tommy gasped.

“I claim her,” Oliver said in a firm voice, and Felicity was so startled by his words she didn’t know if she’d heard him right. She jerked her head in his direction. He was leaning forward and he extended a stiff hand towards Malcolm.

“You can’t claim her,” Malcolm said, tossing a glance at Oliver. “She’s a member of Ogon.”

“Actually, she isn’t,” Oliver said. He reached over and pulled out the record book of Zemlya from his satchel. “These are the records of Zemlya for the past thirty years. I’ve read through them, and Felicity’s mother, Donna, was never expelled from Zemlya. Nor did any man or angel come forward to claim Felicity for another clan as her father. She was born a member of Zemlya, and no request for a transfer of clan to Ogon was ever made on her behalf.” He allowed himself a small smile. “If you examine the records, I think you’ll find evidence that she remains in my clan.”

Malcolm looked furious, but he kept himself in check. “When you say you claim her, you mean that Zemlya will be responsible for her welfare.”

“No,” Oliver said. “When I say I claim her, I mean it in the traditional sense as a clan leader. She’s a Zemlyan, and I claim her. She is mine.”

Felicity clasped Tommy's arm so hard he winced. “What does that mean?” she asked.

“Yours?” Maximilian asked, his chin snapping up. “Is this a formal declaration we’re hearing? Are you claiming a clan leader’s privilege?”

“It is,” Oliver said. “As of this moment, Adalbert’s daughter Felicity is my wife.”

Tommy's eyes widened. He turned to Felicity and said, "It means that you don’t have to worry about our marriage any longer, lovely," he said, “because _Oliver_ is now your husband.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is the last chapter of what I consider the first book of Angels and Archangels. I've mentioned this before, but I've been writing the follow-up story since I finished this one, and I will begin posting it soon. I'm not sure how I should alert readers of this one that the new story is available. I may post a "Chapter 11" with a link. Or, you can always subscribe to me as an AO3 author. 
> 
> Please let me know what you think! Were you expecting the events of this chapter? What was your favorite part of this story and what would you like to see happen next? 
> 
> As always, thanks for reading. :)


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